Professional Documents
Culture Documents
CHRISTIANITY
AND
CLASSICAL
Jaroslav Pelikan
CULTURE
the Christian Encounter with Hellenism
92-42407
CIP
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
The paper in this book meets the guidelines for permanence and durability
of the Committee on Production Guidelines for Book Longevity of the
Council on Library Resources.
10 9 8 7 6
To my daughter, Miriam,
who has deepened and enriched my
own encounter with Hellenism
CONTENTS
Preface
Abbreviations
ix
xiii
PART ONE
Natural Theology as Apologetics
i. Classical Culture and Christian Theology
22
40
57
74
90
107
120
136
152
PART TWO
Natural Theology
as
Presupposition
169
184
zoo
Z15
Z31
Z48
Z63
2.80
Z96
311
3 Z7
Bibliography
335
Index
352-
PREFACE
"When I received the invitation of the Principal and Senatus Academicus of the University of Aberdeen to deliver the Gifford Lectures on Natural Theology in 19921993, I knew immediately
that I would use the lectureship as an opportunity to address,
head-on and at length, the perennial issue of the Christian encounter with Hellenism, because that has been the historical matrix for the very idea of "natural theology." It is an issue with
which I had been preoccupied throughout the four decades of
preparing and writing my history of Christian doctrine, not least
because the greatest of my predecessors in the field, Adolf von
Harnack, had made "the Hellenization of Christianity" central
to his own interpretation. I have discussed it here by looking at
the encounter in the fourth century, which Gilbert Highet has
called "the vital period for the synthesis of Greco-Roman philosophy and Christian thought," as both the encounter and the
synthesis were embodied in the thought of the so-called Three
Cappadocians, Gregory of Nazianzus, Basil of Caesarea, and
Gregory of Nyssa, and of "the Fourth Cappadocian," Macrina,
sister of the last two.
By the title of this book I pay tribute to two scholarly works
that have employed it before (Cochrane 1944; Nock 197Z,
2:67681). But I should perhaps make clear from the outset in
what sense these Gifford Lectures deal with the "Classical culture" that forms part of this titleand, perhaps even more important, in what sense they do not. During their preparation it
has been a constant temptation to trace the lines of development
ix
Preface
Preface
XI
Book of Psalms, following, for all uses of the Septuagint, the most
recent edition by Alfred Rahlfs (Athens and Stuttgart, 1979).
As has been my wont in previous books, I have adopted or
adapted earlier English translations (including my own) at will,
or have provided entirely new ones, without pedantically making
changes for their own sake and without indicating when I was
following which of these courses. This book employs the scheme
of documentation developed for the five volumes of The Christian Tradition, which enables the reader to follow the exposition
without interruption but to pick up a reference to a primary
source with a minimum of effort. Therefore, I have followed the
standard system of citing the Greek church fathers by title of
work (employing the usual Latinized sigla, as listed under Abbreviations) and by book, chapter, and paragraph, with a reference
to the best edition of the Greek text available to me; from this it
should usually be possible to locate the passage in other editions
of the Greek, as well as in most English, French, or German
translations.
In quoting primary sourcesand in preparing the Bibliography of secondary sourcesI have not assumed that my readers
necessarily have a knowledge of any of the languages of the Eastern Christian tradition, and therefore I have, with some reluctance, felt obliged to confine the Bibliography to works in Western languages. But in hopes that it may be helpful also to such
readers, I have at places inserted the original words of the Greek
primary sources, in transliterated form. I have also appended a
Glossary of some two dozen Greek technical terms in Anglicized
spelling, which will, I hope, permit me to use such terms without
stopping to define or translate them each time; to indicate a
reference to the Glossary, these terms appear in italics throughout, and no other terms do.
It is a scholarly duty, but it is also a personal pleasure, to
record my thanks to the many who have contributed to this
book: my audiences at Aberdeen, which included some who have
been listening to Gifford Lectures for several decades; librarians
in various places, and especially at Dumbarton Oaks; critical
readers, among them my late friend, Father John Meyendorff;
and my editors, above all Laura Jones Dooley.
ABBREVIATIONS
Sources
(After Liddell-Scott-Jones, Greek-English Lexicon, and Lampe, Patristic
Greek Lexicon)
Arist.Cat.
Arist.Cae/.
Arist.A.
Aristotle Categoriae
Aristotle De Caelo [On the Heavens]
Aristotle De Anima [On the Soul]
Arist.EN.
Arist.Mer.
Aristotle Metaphysial
Arist.Pol.
Ath.Ar.
Ath.Ep.Afr.
Aug. Conf.
Aristotle Politica
Athanasius Orationes adversus Arianos
Athanasius Epistola ad Afros episcopos
Augustine Confessiones
Aug.Enchir.
Augustine Enchiridion
Aug.Trin.
Augustine De Trinitate
Bas.Ep.
Bas.a.
Bas.Hex.
Bas.Hom.
s.Leg.lib.gent.
Basil Epistoloe
Basil Adversus Eunomium
Basil In Hexoemeron
Basil Homiliae
Basil Ad adotescentes de legendis libris gentilium [Letter to young men on
reading the books of the Gentiles]
Bas.Mor.
Basil Moralia
Bas.SprV.
C Chalc.De/.
CCP (381)
Abbreviations
CFlor.(l438-45)De/'.
Cyc.Juln.
Eun.
Gr.Naz.Carm.
Gr.Naz.Ep.
Gr.Naz.Or.
Gr.Nyss.Am'm.res.
Gr.Nyss./lpo//.
Gregorius Nyssenus De anima et resurrectione [On the soul and the resurrection]
{
Gregorius Nyssenus Adversus Apollinarem
Gt.Nyss.Beat.
Gr.Nyss.Carcf.
Gr.Nyss. Comm.not.
Gr.Nyss. Deit.
Gr.Nyss.Diff.ess.
Gr.Nyss. Ep.
Gr.Nyss.Eun.
notionibus
Gregorius Nyssenus De deitate Filii et Spiritus Sancti [On the deity of the
Son and the Holy Spirit]
Gregorius Nyssenus De differentia essentiae et hypostaseos
Gregorius Nyssenus Epistolae
Gregorius Nyssenus Contra Eunomium
Gr.Nyss. Fat.
Gr.Nyss.KJ.
Gr.Nyss.Hex.
Gr. Nyss .Horn. op if.
Gr.Nyss.Infant.
Gr.Nyss. Maced.
Gi.Nyss.Or.catecb.
Gr.Nyss. Or. dom.
Gr.Nyss. Ref.
Gr.Nyss.Res.
Gr.Nyss.Tres dii
Gr.Nyss. Trin.
'
Gregorius Nyssenus Quod non sint tres dii [That there are not three gods]
Gregorius Nyssenus Ad Eustathium de Trinitate
Gr.Nyss. V.Macr.
Gr.Nyss. V.Mos.
Gr.Nyss. Virg.
Gr.Presb.V.Gr.Naz.
Hdt.
Horn.//.
Hom.Od.
Homer Odyssea
hen.Haer.
Jo.D.F.o.
Jo.D.Trans.
Homer llias
Domini
Abbreviations
Juln.Imp.
Lib.
Lit.Bas.
Macr.
Or.Cels.
Pi.O.
Julianus Imperator
Libanius Sophista
Liturgy of Saint Basil
Macrina (the Younger)
Origenes Contra Celsum
Pindar Olympian Odes
PlAp.
Plato Apologia
Pl.Cn.
PILg.
Plato Crito
Pl.Men.
Plato Meno
Pl.Phd.
PLPhdr.
Pl.Prt.
Plato Protagoras
Pl.R.
Plato Kespublica
PISmp.
Plato Symposium
PITht.
Plato Tbeaetetus
Pl.Tim.
Plato Timaeus
'tol.Alm.
Socr.H.e.
Soz.H.e.
Ptolemaeus Almagest
Socrates Scholasticus Historia ecclesiastica
Sozomen Historia ecclesiastica
Symb.Nic.
Symbolum
Symb.Nic.-CP
Symbolum
Tert.Praescrip.
Th.
Thos.Aq.S.T.
Nicaenum
Nicaeno-Constantinopolitanum
Thucydides Historicus
Thomas Aquinas Summa Theologica
Brightman
. '' Courtonne
CGSL
DTC
Florovsky
Abbreviations
Gallay
GCS
Harvey
Hussey
Jaeger
1921-.
Lampe
LTK
Meridier
Meyendorff
Miiller
OCD
ODCC
OED
PC
Quasten
SC
Sophocles
Van Heck
Wilson
Wilson, Nigel Guy, ed. Saint Basil on the Value of Greek Literature.
London: Duckworth, 1975.
PART
ONE
Natural Theology as Apologetics
What born fools were all who lived in ignorance of God! From
the good things before their eyes they could not learn to know
him who is, and failed to recognize the artificer though they
observed his handiwork! Fire, wind, swift air, the circle of the
starry signs, rushing water, or the great lights in heaven that
rule the worldthese they accounted gods. If it was through
delight in the beauty of these things that people supposed them
gods, they ought to have understood how much better is the
Lord and master of them all; for it was by the prime author of
all beauty they were created. If it was through astonishment at
their power and influence, people should have learnt from
these how much more powerful is he who made them. For the
greatness and beauty of created things give us a corresponding
idea of their Creator.
Wisdom of Solomon 13:15
CHAPTER
Voobus 1987,9-ui
Jn 1:1
Heb 1:3
Gr.Nyss. Or.catech. 1
(Meridier 8-16)
Rv 1:4
Hahn 1963
Moulton 1908,90
Ex 3:14
Ath.Ar.1.11
(PG 16:33)
Gottwald 1906,2213
Gr.Nyss.wM.i.637
(Jaeger 1:209)
ap.Jaki 1986,72
Jaeger 1947,1
Gilson 1944
Shook 1984,183
Barth 1938
Jaki 1978
Jaki 1986,39
Gilson 1944,5011
thought; for both Gilson and Barth dealt almost exclusively with
the Latin West, whether Catholic or Protestant, and neither addressed, except in passing, the place of "natural theology" in the
Greek Christian East.
When the Gifford Lectures were inaugurated in 1881, the
most eminent religious thinker in the British Isleswho was, by
almost universal consensus, John Henry Newman, eighty years
old but destined to live on for almost another decadewas not
named as the first incumbent. (This slight to Newman was paralleled by the failure a few years later to confer the first Nobel prize
in literature on Leo Tolstoy.) The reason could not have been an
assumption that Newman was not interested in "natural theology," for he had made this the foundation for the most influential
Newman 1852,3.10
(Ker 1971,71)
Cross 1945,10
"
Norris 1991,185
Kopecek 1973,453
Otis 1958,97
See pp.259-62,32426,
22527, below
Giet 1941b
ap.Barrois 1986,9
Gr.Naz.Or.43.59 ...
(PG 36:57^-73)
:.
Bas.Ep.58
(Courtonne 1:145 *t7)v
Gr.Naz.Or.43.S7
(PG 36:585) v'i.
Quasten 3:104,136,254,
155,283
Lebon 1953,632
Florovsky 7:107,119,147
Gr.Nyss. V.Macr.
(Jaeger 8-1:383)
Gr.Nyss.Anim.res.
(PG 46:12)
Gr.Nyss. Horn, opif.pr.
(PG 44:125)
Harnack 1931,1:60
Gr.Nyss.Anim.res.
(PG 46:1 29)
Pl.Phd.84C-d
Cherniss 1930,3;
Apostolopoulos
1986,10910
Momigliano 1987,
208,21920
Brown 1988,342
N a t u r a l Theology as Apologetics
Coulie 1983,4246
Gr.Naz.O.7.7-8
(PG 35:761-64)
Gr.Naz.Or.21.6
(SC 270:120)
Gr.Nyss.CWom.5
(PG 44:1188)
Acts 7:22
Gr.Nyss.V.Mas.i
(Jaeger 7-1:7-8)
Gr.Nyss.V.Mos.2
(Jaeger 7-1:139)
Has.Leg.lib.gent.}
(Wilson 2122)
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:28)
Cazeaux 1980
ap.Highet 1957,560
the monuments of that culture and with contemporary expositors of the monuments. Gregory of Nazianzus claimed that there
was nothing inconsistent with the Christian gospel in the Classical learning of such Christian scholars as his brother, Caesarius.
After all, even the sainted Athanasius of Alexandria had studied
Classical literature and philosophy. Gregory of Nyssa was conscious of the cultural differences between more cultivated and
"more barbarian peoples," a term that does seem to have referred
to the differences between the Greek-speaking peoples and those
who did not speak Greek; he also added the warning, however,
that sin and vice were universal, regardless of language or level of
culture. For him, the supreme example of how the believer could
properly benefit from pagan learning was Moses, who had, according to the Book of Acts, " 'received a paideia in all the sopbia
of the Egyptians,' a powerful speaker and a man of action."
Therefore "the paideia of the outsiders" was not to be shunned,
but cultivated. What it imparted, moreover, as the text of Acts
conceded, was not nonsense, despite its pagan origins, but an
authentic sopbia of some kind. According to Basil, "even Moses,
that illustrious man, with the greatest name for sopbia among all
mankind, first trained his mind in the learning of the Egyptians
[tois Aigyption mathemasin angynasamenos ten dianoian], and
then proceeded to the contemplation of the one who is [tei theoriai tou ontos]." Macrina, too, drew on the ideas of "various
writers," chiefly pagan philosophical writers, in her disquisition
on the soul, and she quoted "wise men"whom she did not
identify by name in this context, although from other statements
attributed to her it would appear to have been Greek philosophers whom she had in mindabout man as "microcosm."
Among the Cappadocians, Basil has been in some respects the
most influential exponent of such Christian Hellenism, at any
rate in its purely literary aspects, as well as of the Christian critique of Hellenism. It was true of him, as it was of the other
Cappadocians, that, as Werner Jaeger once observed specifically
with them in mind, "the love of simplicity in the Church Fathers is
often only a traditional Christian attitude, and the sophisticated
style in which they actually write proves that it is a concession
which they have to make, just as nowadays even the most fastidious aesthete starts with a bow to the 'common man.'" In describing the virtues of "the gentleman" as the product of a liberal
education that included generous doses of Classical culture, John
Henry Newman commented: "Basil and Julian were fellow-
Newman 1852,8.10
(Ker 1976,181)
Wright i9Z3,3:xli-xliii
Kertsch 1978
Seeck 1906,30-34,
468-71
Schucan 1973
Bas. Leg. lib.gent.
(Wilson 1936)
Goemans 1945
Armstrong 1984,8
Biittner 1908,59-60.
Asmus 1910,325-67
11
students at the schools of Athens; and one became the Saint and
Doctor of the Church, the other her scoffing and relentless foe."
The supposed correspondence between Basil and Julian to which
Newman may have been alluding is assuredly not authentic, although it remains historically true that Gregory of Nazianzus
was Julian's fellow student at Athens in the summer of the year
355 and that they shared a rhetorical tradition and rhetorical ',
teachers. Yet, most scholars today are prepared to accept the
authenticity of most if not all of the letters exchanged between
Basil and the pagan rhetor Libanius of Antioch. Above all, it was
Basil's educational treatise on the reading of pagan books by
Christians, generally cited by the Latin form of its title as Ad
adolescentes de legendis libris gentilium, that decisively articulated in a succinct but comprehensive summary his positive assessment of the Classical tradition, an assessment that for the
most part he shared with the other three Cappadocians. Although there was, according to Basil, much in the Classical tradition that was morally repugnant and doctrinally erroneous, there
was also much to be gained from an exposure to it; and his
nephews, to whom he addressed the treatise in the form of a
letter, were to take advantage of the opportunity to study it.
Hence it would be, he insisted, a mistake for anyone to spurn
Classical learning in the name of Christian piety and orthodoxy.
Basil believed, as A. Hilary Armstrong has put it, "that by judicious selection and Christian teaching the classics could be, so to
speak, 'decaffeinated,' their pernicious pagan content neutralized, and what was useful in them turned to wholly Christian
purposes." In Basil's treatise, according to one study, the purely
Christian sources played a relatively minor role; and another
study has used it to document the "widespread willingness to
admit unhesitatingly the identity of the highest pagan and Christian ideals of morality."
At least some of these positive assessments of the Classical
tradition and recommendations that it be studied by Christians
came from the Cappadocians in response to the conscious revival
of that tradition in the name of a recrudescent paganism by the
emperor Julian ("the Apostate"), which took place during the
less than two years of his brief reign as sole emperor between
November 361 and June 363. In a rescript forbidding Christian
professors to teach the pagan Classics, Julian sought to break up
the alliance between Christianity and Classical culture and to
reclaim that culture for paganism by wresting it from the hands of
Downey 1957,97-163
Albertz 1909,228
Gr.Naz.Or.4.23
(SC 309:11618)
Gr.Naz.Or.4.43
(SC 309:142-44)
Kurmann 1988,339-41
Jul.ap.Gr.Naz.Or.4.101
(SC 309:250)
Gr.Naz.Or.4.5;i03
{SC 309:921252-54)
Bas.Hex.3.8
(SC 26:232-34)
Bas.Hejc.1.10
(SC 26:130)
2 Cor 6:15
Bas.w.i.9
(SC 299:200)
Unterstein 1903,7476
Acts 8:22
Bas.Eww.i.6
(SC 299:184)
Gr.Nyss.Hex.
(PG 44:65)
Gr.Nyss.V.Mos.i
(Jaeger 7-1:7-8)
Gr.Nyss. V.Mos. 2
(Jaeger 7-1:37)
Gr.Naz.Or.7.8
(PG 35:764)
Hauser-Meury i960,
J34-35
Gr.Naz.Or.18.10
(PG 35:996)
Jul.ap.Gr.Naz.Or.4.102
(SC 309:2.50)
Gr.Naz.Or.4.107
(SC 309:258)
Gr.Naz.or.5.30
(50309:354)
Gr.Naz.or.23.12
(SC 270:3046)
Ernst 1896,62664;
Scazzoso 1975,24959
Bas.Ep.90-2
(Courtonne 1:19596)
1 Cor 3:19
Gr.Naz.Or.36.12
(SC 318:266)
Gr.Naz.Or.4.73
(SC 309:188-90)
Fabricius 1962,118&&
Hdt 1.57-58
Norris 1991
13
14
nal character as late as the sixth century; that is, it was ancient
Greek in the strictest sense of the expression," in a way and to a
degree that definitely could not be applied to the Koine of the
Sophocles 9
Hoey 1930,114
Jul.ap.Gr.Naz.0.4.101
(SC 309:250)
Gr.Naz.Or.4.5;io3
(SC 309:91,252-54)
Gr.Nyss.EHH. 1.482
(Jaeger 1:166)
Gr.Nyss.EwM.2.246
(Jaeger 1:298)
See pp.40-56,200-114
OCD 6 0 5 - 6
Quasten 3:22223
Lib.ap.Bas.Ep. 338
(Courtonne 3:205)
Bas.Ep.135.1-1
(Courtonne 2:4950)
Majren 1956,168
Campbell 1922
Camelot 1966,23-30
Kennedy 1983,215
Gr.Nyss. V.Macr.
(Jaeger 8-1:375)
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:145)
'
*$
i6
Gt,V}yss.Or.dotH.i
(Wj;44:ii*il'
Gr.Naz.Ep.i 1.4
(Gallay 1:17)
Gr.Nyss.V.Ater.
(Jaeger 8-1:377)
See p p . i 8 i - 8 z below
Gr.Naz.Or.43.13
(PG 36:512)
Gr.Naz.Or.7.1
(PG 35:756)
Gr.Naz.Or.43.15
(/'G 36:513-16)
Bas.Leg.lib.gent.
(Wilson 19-36)
Gr.Nyss.Ewn-2.619
(Jaeger 1:407)
Gr.Naz.Or.4.115
(^309:272-74)
Gr.Naz.Or.39.7
(PG 36:341)
Gr.Nyss.V/rg.3
(Jaeger 8-1:2.65-66)
Gr.Naz.Or.4.71
(SC 309:181)
Gr.Naz.Or.4.116
(SC 309:276)
Browning 1975,15-33
Gr.Naz.Or.43.3
(PG 36:497)
Horn. Od.9.27
Gr.Naz.Or.43.17
(PG 36:520)
Horn. II. 11.496
Horn. Od.S. 492
Gr.Naz.fIp.5.1
(Gallay 1:5-6)
Pi.O.6.1
Gr.Naz.Or.43.20
(PG 36:521)
Bas.fp.147
(Courtonne 2:68)
Pl.R.488
Bas.rZp.3.1
(Courtonne 1:14)
Bas.JSp.204.5
(Courtonne 2:177)
17
N a t u r a l Theology as Apologetics
Bas.Ep.8.2
(Courtonne 1:23)
Bas.S/H'r.3.5
(5C 17:264)
Gr.Nyss.EHH. 3.6.56
(Jaeger 2:206)
Gr.Nyss.EwB.2.405
(Jaeger 1:344)
Gr.Nyss.Ewn.1.186
(Jaeger 1:81)
1 Cor 1:20
Gr.Nyss.EMH.3.8.43
(Jaeger 2:255)
Gr.Nyss.EMn.3.2.35
(Jaeger 2:63)
Arist.Car.ia
Gr.Naz.Or.29.15
(SC 250:208)
Gr.Naz.Ep.101
(PG 37:188)
Gr.Nyss.ApoW.45
(Jaeger 3-1:2.06)
Bas.EwM.1.5
^299:172-74)
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:52.)
Ghellinck 1930,542
1 Cor 1:17
Gr.Naz.Or.2,9.21
(SC 250:224)
Gr.Naz.Or.25.6
(SC 284:168)
Gr.Nyss.Eww. 1.46
(Jaeger 1:37-41 [var.D
Bas.Sp/V.17.42
(SC 17:396)
Acts 17:18
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:21)
19
Gr.Naz.Or.4.72
(SC 309:184-86:
Jaki 1978,47
Apostotopoulos 1986
O'Meara 1982
Courcelie 1967,4026
See pp.95-97
Giet 1968,57-59
Gr.Nyss. Maced.
(Jaeger 3-1:99)
Pl.Twi.29e
Pl.Tzw.27d
Gr.Nyss.Ca(.6
(Jaeger 6:173)
Gr.Naz.O.28.4
(SC 250:106-8)
Pepin 1982,251-60
Pl.Tim.28c
Pl.Tw2.19b
Gr.Naz.Or.4.113
(SC 309:270)
Caird 1904,2:359
Florovsky 12:23 30
Grillmeier 1958,332-43
Gragg 1968,3-31
Nftflering 1985,11-48
Uhttrstein 1903
zr
CHAPTER
See pp.74-89
Gr.Naz.Or.2.95
(SC 247:21214)
Gr.Naz.Or.43.13
(PG 36:512)
Gr.Nyss. V.Macr.
(Jaeger 8-1:403)
Gr.Nyss.Or.ctftecfc.18.3
(Meridier 94)
H0111.J/.1.39
Ps 10:4; Rv 3:12
2.2
Gr.Naz.Or.5.23
(SC 309:336)
1 Cor 4:1
Gr.Naz.Or.i.26
(SC 247:124)
See pp.298301
Antoniadis 1939,
149-51,346-57
1 Cor 5:8
Gr.Naz.Or.45.10
(PG 36:636)
ap.Cochrane 1944,
286-88
Gr.Naz. Or. 3 9.1
(PG 36:356)
Gr.Naz.Or.39.7
(PG 36:341)
Gr.Nyss.Ewn.2.61819
(Jaeger 1:407)
Gr.Naz.Or.30.6
(SC 250:236)
iPt4:i3
Gr.Naz.Or.25.13
(SC 284:186)
Gr.Nyss.Beat.2
(PG 44:1209)
23
but with the anticlerical, rationalistic exponents of a philosophical natural theology among pagan Greek thinkers; for they were
conscious of the distinction between traditional Greek religion
and critical Greek thought. They knew themselves to be as well,
in the New Testament title, "stewards of the mysteries of God," a
title that they understood to refer also to the sacramental "mysteries" of the church, not only to the mystery of revelation through
the economy of Christ as such. Yet they found no positive connection between the sacramental mysteries over which they were
presiding and the pagan "mysteries," even though these did bear
some similarities to the Christian ritual, especially in the forms
which that ritual had acquired by the fourth century (regardless
of whether the liturgy traditionally attributed to Basil came directly from him, in whole or in part). Much of the vocabulary that
was used in Christian Greek to speak about the observance of
these Christian mysteries was, moreover, dependent on such liturgical terminology as the Classical Greek verbs "panegyrizein
[to celebrate]," which did not appear in the New Testament at all,
and "heortazein [to keep a festival]," which occurred in the New
Testament only once. Somewhat to their embarrassment, the expositors of Christian liturgical theology seem to have found such
terminology almost indispensable, in spite of the parallel use of
these terms in the language of pagan religion, although they were
also aware at the same time that some of the vocabulary of the
Christian liturgy had come from Hebrew rather than from
Greek.
With their cultivation of Greek language and literature, they
fundamentally rejected the emperor Julian's linkage between the
writings of the Classical authors and "the religion in which they
believed." For them, therefore, "Greek error" seems in the first
instance to have been a term for the "solemnities [semna]" of
Greek religious observance. Greek religious practice and the
Greek myth underlying it were both dismissed as the invention of
demons. The Cappadocians were consistently critical of the "poets and moulders of mythology" in the Greek tradition. They did
speak of the Gospel accounts of the crucifixion of Christ as "a
marvelously constructed drama"; and because the persecution
endured by Christians in the Roman Empire east and west was a
"sharing" in the crucifixion, they could likewise describe this as a
"drama." The illustrations that Christ employed in his preaching
were likened to the costumes and stage props in the performance
of the Greek tragedies, which symbolized the truth being conveyed but were not identical with it. But such usage, reflecting as
24
Gr.Nyss.Virg.3
(Jaeger 8-1:265-66)
Gr.Naz.Or.43.!
(PG 36:504)
Eriau 1914
Gr.Naz.Or.4.114
(50309:272
Gr.Naz.Or.4.117
(5C 309:280)
Jaeger 1939-44,2:43
Gr.Nyss.Eim.1.186
(Jaeger 1:81)
Gr.Nyss.V.Mos.2
(Jaeger 7-1:43)
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:72)
it did the language and allusions that would have come naturally
to the lips of highly educated students of Classical Greek in any
age, should not be permitted to obscure their attacks on the
dramatic poets of Classical literature for retelling the shocking
stories of ancient Greek mythology, which did not teach people
about divine truth, as they purported to do, but about the "network of evils that human life is." In spite of its appeal for students
of Greek literature in every era, including Racine and Goethe in
the modern era, a dramatic legend like that of Iphigenia was
simply "too disgraceful" to serve as the basis for "emulation"
and edification. For all their knowledge of Classical Greek literature and their readiness to cite it with familiarity and affection,
therefore, they followed the widespread practice of early Christians in using the word "theater" primarily as a term of contempt. They also distinguished, as Gregory of Nazianzus did
when writing against the emperor Julian, between the "myths" of
Greek religion and literature, be they true or false, and the "natural theologians" among the Greek thinkers. The Christian encounter with Hellenism had to do primarily with these "natural
theologians." Therefore, it was the consistent assumption of
Cappadocian apologetics that, in the words of Werner Jaeger,
"the Greek spirit reached its highest religious development, not in
the cults of the gods . . . but chiefly in philosophy, assisted by the
Greek gift for constructing systematic theories of the universe." It
was chiefly in critical and constructive relation to these Classical
philosophical and scientific theories rather than to Classical
myths or rituals that they formulated their own natural theology.
For Gregory of Nyssa was, in effect, articulating the foundation for a natural theology when he defended Christian orthodoxy against heresy by invoking three authorities, whose relative
force he did not specify here, although he did make it somewhat
clearer elsewhere: the Greek thinkers whom he identified as
"those who philosophized outside the faith"; "the inspired writings" of the Old and the New Testament; and what he called "the
common apprehension" of humanity. Elsewhere, too, he spoke of
a "moral and natural philosophy [he ethike te kai physike philosophia]," in which each of these three authorities had some part.
As reported by him, Macrina's formulation of this juxtaposition
between "the common apprehension of humanity" and "the inspired writings" spoke about "believing on the basis both of the
prevailing opinion and of the tradition of the Scriptures
[pepisteuetai ek te tes koines hypolepseos, kai ek tes ton graphon
paradoseosl." Their brother Basil, in discussing the Christian
c .
Bas.spm9.zz
(SC i7:3zz)
See pp.2z.7-29
..
. .
e z 190 ,5
thers." Although the third of these has evoked the most spirited
discussion because of Christian theological debates about the
relation between Scripture and tradition, it is not clear whether
by the first of them he meant conceptions that were truly "common" and universal and therefore "natural," or only conceptions
"common" to all Christians, because what he was talking about
was, as the complete phrase indicated, "common conceptions
concerning the [Holy] Spirit" or perhaps "common conceptions
concerning the spirit" as such, whether divine or human. But it
would appear to be at least permissible, in the light of their
common use of the word "common [koinos]," to see in these
"common conceptions" of Basil's some equivalent of Gregory's
"common apprehension of humanity" and of Macrina's "prevailing opinion." And Gregory of Nazianzus, though writing
chiefly for a Christian audience rather than a pagan one, could
declare: "That God, the creative and sustaining cause of all, ex'
Eun.ap.Bas.wM.i.5
(SC 299:170)
'
ists, both our sight and the law of nature inform us."
Because the Christian audience whom Gregory of Nazianzus
was addressing with these words about an agreement on this
point between "the law of nature" and personal experience included those whom he regarded as heretics on the doctrine of the
relation between the Father and the Son in the Trinity, the position of those Arian heretics on natural theology is of more than
incidental interest. "The most important man in the neo-Arian
church" and the most able as a "technoloeue" of dialectic was
Vandenbussche 1944-45,
57
2 . 5
Gr.Naz.Or.28.6
(SC 2.50:110)
:.,.:.-.
ten
Nicene
ton orthodoxy
pateron didaskalian]."
with the troubling
When
language
Basil sought
of the New
to square
Testa-
2.6
N a t u r a l Theology as Apologetics
Acts 2:36
See pp.26466
Bas.Eun.z.z 3
(SC 305:1218)
ment about the history of Jesus by invoking the traditional distinction between the theology of the Godhead in and of itself and
the economy of the Godhead in its relation to history, Eunomius
attacked Basil's effort on the grounds that "the very nature of
things" was repugnant to this harmonization, as was also the
teaching of the Scriptures. Elsewhere, too, it was on the basis
simultaneously of the way "things themselves [auta ta pragmata]" were and of "the sayings accepted on faith [ta pepisteumena logia]" that Eunomius argued. Articulating the first
principles of his theology, he appealed "at once to nature itself
and to the divine laws" to prove that his position could not be
refuted. Gregory of Nyssa summarized Eunomius's doctrine of
the relation between the natural and the revealed this way:
"If . . . this is a standard of truth that admits of no deception
[horos tes aletheias aparalogistos], that these two concurthe
'natural order,' as he says, and the testimony of the knowledge
given from above concerning the natural interpretationit is
clear that to assert anything contrary to these is nothing else than
to fight manifestly against the truth itself." That paraphrase of
Eunomius's presuppositions appears to have been fair, and in
itself it was not overtly condemnatory of them. Later in the same
treatise, however, Gregory did take exception to these presuppositions when he objected that nature was "not trustworthy for
instruction as to the divine process of generation [within the
Trinity], not even taking the universe itself as an illustration of the
argument." Yet, he could, near the beginning of the treatise,
attack Eunomius for a method of theological argumentation that
proceeded "unphilosophically."
Eun.ap.Gr.Nyss..
3.3.19 (Jaeger 2:114)
Eun.ap.Gr.Nyss.n.
3.10.26 (Jaeger 2:299)
Eun.ap.Gr.Nyss.Eww.
3.7.26 (Jaeger 2:224)
Gr.Nyss.EMW.3.1.6
(Jaeger 2:5)
Gr.Nyss.EwH.3.7.34
(Jaeger 2:227)
Gr.Nyss.M.i.i86
(Jaeger 1:81)
Gr.Nyss.How.opj^.pr.
(PG 44:128)
Gr.Nyss.Or.dom.z
(PG 44:1140)
Gr.Nyss.Ctfwf.13
(Jaeger 6:376)
LTK 7:830-35
Gr.Nyss.Cawf.7
(Jaeger 6:209-10);
Bas.EHH.2.24
(SC 305:98)
Gr.Nyss.//af.
(Jaeger 3-11:86)
Bas.Ep.160.2
(Courtonne 2:88-89)
Gr.Nyss./iw*'m.res.
(PG 46:64)
Gr.Naz. Or. 29.21
{SC 250:204)
See pp.21530
27
2.8
Gr.Nyss.Anim.res.
(PG 46:108)
Gr.Nyss.EMM.1.315
(Jaeger 1:120)
Gr.Nyss. Maced.
(Jaeger 3-1:90-91)
Gr.Nyss.Ctfrtf. 13
(Jaeger 6:376)
Acts 17:18
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:21)
Asmus 1910,325-67
Bas.Ep.236.7
(Courtonne 3:54)
See pp.82-84
Gr.Nyss.EK/1.3.9.59
(Jaeger 2:286)
N a t u r a l Theology as Apologetics
the basis of Scripture," it was not desirable "to leave this part of
the subject without philosophical examination," because "the
weakness of the human understanding" could be "strengthened
still more by any intelligible rational arguments [logismois]." As
the polemic against Eunomius illustrated, this coordinate use of
revelation and reason was also intended, within the circle of orthodox Christian theological discourse, as a weapon against heretical doctrine. Here it acted as "our reason, under the guidance
of Scripture." This instrumental use of reason in the service of
theology helped to clarify, for example, the status of metaphysical distinctions within the divine nature, which superficially
seemed to be able to claim authority "either from the teaching of
the Scriptures or from our common conceptions [ek ton koinon
ennoion]," but which in fact conflicted with the fundamental
teaching, on which Scripture and those common conceptions
agreed, of "the utter simplicity of the divine and transcendent
nature." But at least as important was the distinct, though not
always separate, role that this method of coordinating reason and
revelation played in the Christian encounter with Hellenism. The
two tasks of polemics against heresy and apologetics against
Hellenism were often seen as connected, as when the twofold
method of true doctrine and clear reasoning was said to be directed "against both the heathen and the heretical systems of
belief about God [eis ethnikas te kai hairetikas peri tou theou
doxas]." But the function of continuing the Christian apologetic
enterprise, an enterprise that had begun when the apostle Paul
encountered "the Stoics and Epicureans collected at Athens,"
received new prominence as the Cappadocians encountered both
the political and the intellectual reassertions of the case in support of Hellenism during the second half of the fourth century.
The polemical aspect of this twofold apologetic method,
therefore, was to seek to show that, for example, the Greek doctrine of tycbe, which was condemned by "true religion" in the
name of the doctrines of divine providence and of human free
will, was also an error that was "inconsistent with common
sense." On the positive side, this method of apologetics proceeded by attempting to tease out true doctrines that were, howsoever indistinctly, implicit in the natural theology of the Greeks.
The relation of polytheism to monotheism provided the Cappadocians with an opportunity to do just that, for the implicit
assumption behind the philosophical critique of the passionridden gods of Mount Olympus by the "natural theologians"
among the Greeks seemed to be a shadowy monotheism. More
N a t u r a l Theology -m Apologetics
Gr.Naz.Or.31.16
[SC 250:306)
Dt6:4
Gr.Nyss. Tres dii
(Jaeger 3-1:55)
See pp.99105
Gr.Nyss. V.Mos.z
(Jaeger 7-1:37);
Ras.Leg.lib.gent.)
(Wilson 2122)
Ex 7:813
Gr.Naz.Or.21.6
(SC 2 7 0 : 1 2 0 )
Gr.Nyss.
Hom.opif. ep.ded.
(PG 44:125)
Gr.Naz.Or.7.7-8
(PG 35:761-64)
See pp.32426
Diekamp 1899,12938;
Holl 1928,31050;
Richardson 1937,5064;
Ivanka 1951,291303
Rebecchi 1943,32225
29
Gr.Nyss.Hom.opif.
(PG 44:119-}!)
Gr.Nyss.Gmtpr.
(Jaeger 6:13)
Bas.Hex.3.9
(SC 26:236)
Gen 1:24
Bas.Hex.9.1
(SC 26:478-80)
G1.Nyss.H0m.0pif.pt.
(PG 44:125)
See pp.1016
Gt.Nyss.V.Mos.z
(Jaeger 7-1:43)
Bas.Hex.9.4
(SC 26:498)
Bas. Leg.lib.gent. 1 o
(Wilson 35)
Wilson 197s, 69
Gr.Nyss.Apoll.
(Jaeger 3-1:164)
Arist.EN.1128a.25
Gr.Nyss. V.Macr.
(Jaeger 8-1:401)
Scholl 1881,97-100
Bas.Het.9.4
(SC 26:496-98)
Bas.Hex.7.5
[SC 26:41416)
Gr.Naz.Or.30.19
(SC 250:26466)
Gr.Naz.or.18.38
(PG 35:1036)
Ps 89:9
ap.Hdt.1.32
Gr.Naz.Or.4.121 (SC
309:286)
Eph 6:4
Bas.Hex.9.4
(SC 26:498)
Gr.Naz.Or.42.22
(PG 36:485)
Bas. Leg.lib.gent. 7
(Wilson 27)
Mt 5:4044
Gr.Naz.Or.37.6
(SC 318:282-84)
Bas.fip.217.73
(Courtorme 2:213)
31
Christian morality and Classical morality agreed in defining virtue as "praiseworthy" and vice as "altogether devoid of praise."
What Greek moralists had said about "good order and decency"
could be applied by Christian theologians to exemplary Christian morality, too. According to Basil's view of "the possibility of
morally good behavior without grace," it was "by nature herself,
not by education," which would seem to include even Christian
catechetical education, that the human soul had affinity with
arete. Without education and by nature alone, then, there existed
"a natural rationality implanted in us, telling us to identify ourselves with the good and to avoid everything harmful." This it did
by appealing to motivations that were also naturally implanted in
the human heart, including "fear of punishment, hope for salvation and glory too, and the practice of the aretai, which results in
these." What Gregory of Nazianzus, on the basis of the Psalms,
referred to as "David's limit of our age" to seventy was precisely
corroborated by the Greek lawgiver and wise man Solon of
Athens. The Cappadocians gave no indication of having found
such parallels with the Classical tradition threatening to their
Christian faith. They recognized the universal character of the
moral imperatives for children to honor their parents and for
parents to respect their children. The parallels between the Classical and Christian doctrines simply meant: "Paul teaches us
nothing new, but only tightens the links of nature." The Classical
arete of "moderation" was one to which a Christian might also
aspire. Classical examples of restraint, according to Basil, tended
"to nearly the same end as our own precepts [schedon eis tauton
tois hemeterois]," as these were set forth by Christ in the Sermon
on the Mount. For all the parallelism in ethical theory, however,
Cappadocian apologetics was always ready to point out the glaring inconsistency between Classical theory and Greco-Roman
practice, notably in the area of sexual morality, while acknowledging also that Christian practice often fell short of the ideal.
But in apologetics no less than in dogmatics, the admonition
of the moral imperative to "be weaned away from all experience
of evil," with which the Catechetical Oration of Gregory of
Nyssa concluded, was based on the affirmation of doctrine, with
which the Catechetical Oration began, "the need of a system of
instruction [ho tes katecheseos logos]." The apologetic method
of pointing out parallels but also contrasts between Christianity
and Classical culture, and then of teasing out the truth in the
parallels, suited the doctrinal realm at least as well as it did the
ethical. Gregory of Nyssa, in a succinct passage of his Life of
Gr.Nyss.V.Mos.2
(Jaeger 7-1:44)
Gr.Nyss.V.Mos.i
(Jaeger 7-1:37)
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:1089)
Gr.Naz.Or.28.13
(SC 250:128)
See pp.95-97
Seepp.155-58
BaS.EMM.2.22
(SC 305:88)
Gr.Nyss. Or.catech.^.z
(Meridier 18-2.0)
See PP.Z44-47
Gr.Naz.Or.31.10
(SC 2.50:294)
Bas.Ep.38.5
(Courtonne 1:89)
Gr.Naz.Or.31.11
(SC 250:29496)
Horn.H.15.189
Gr.Naz. Or. 31.16
(SC 250:306)
Bernardi 1968
Bas.Eww.1.2
(SC 299:148)
See pp.1719
33
middle between the two conceptions [of polytheism and of undifferentiated unity], destroying each heresy and yet accepting
everything useful from each." The natural theology at work in
this statement of trinitarian doctrine will claim our close attention later, but already here it suggests how dogmatics and apologetics interacted in the Cappadocian system. A sensitivity to the
limitations of the argument from analogy prompted each Cappadocian to be cautious about "taking from things below a guess
at things above," but it certainly did not paralyze them in their
speculative and apologetic enterprise. A reading of the doctrine
of the Trinity that would end up preserving the Three by asserting
that there were "three gods" would be, according to Gregory of
Nyssa, "blasphemous [athemiton]," whereas a reading that preserved the One by denying divinity to the Son and the Holy Spirit
would be at one and the same time "irreligious and absurd [asebes te kai atoponj," which it would seem to be acceptable to
paraphrase as: contrary both to revealed theology and to natural
theology. There were natural phenomena, such as the rainbow,
which showed that "speaking of the same thing as being both
conjoined and parted," as the orthodox dogma of the Trinity did
in speaking about God, was not altogether unheard-of even apart
from revelation. Similarly, there were some schools of thought
among the Greeks, "those more inclined to speak of God and to
approach nearest to us," where there was some anticipation of
the orthodox doctrine of the Holy Spirit, which they had "addressed as the mind of the world, the external mind, and the like."
Even for the Nicene homoousion there were some natural analogies, such as the consubstantiality of Adam, Eve, and Seth, which
showed, howsoever imperfectly, that those with a different individual being could nevertheless be homoousios. When Homer
spoke of "all things being divided thrice," this, too, could perhaps be seen as an anticipation, albeit dim, of the Christian doctrine of the Trinity.
These various themes indicate that the Cappadocians had in
mind several overlapping but distinct audiences to whom they
were addressing their apologetics, and therefore several distinct
uses to which they intended to put their apologetics. For it was
not only truth but also heresy that could set forth an "apologia."
Therefore, when the Cappadocians referred in a single phrase to
"the heathen and the heretical systems of belief about God," they
were expressing not only their oft-expressed opinion that the false
teachings of the heretics were the result also of the corrosive
influence of alien philosophy and belief, but a sense of strategy
36
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:14548)
Bas.Hex.3.7
{SC 26:22.4)
Bas.Hex.3.5
(SC 26:212)
Bas.EP.52.3
(Courtonne 1:136)
Gr.Nyss.CiiMf. 15
(Jaeger 6:460)
Diekamp 1896,1826
Gr.Nyss.Or.cdtecfc.15.4
(Meridier 80)
Gr.Nyss.EMW.1-315
(Jaeger 1:120)
Gr.Nyss. Paup. 1
(Van Heck 13)
Malingrey 1961,212-13
Bas.Hex.3.3
(SC 26:202)
Bas.Ep.38.3
(Courtonne 1:8284)
N a t u r a l Theology as Apologetics
N a t u r a l Theology as Apologetics
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:64)
Gr.Nyss. Anim.res.
(PG 46:64)
Gr.Naz.Or.22.11
(5C 270:2.42)
Norris 1991,127-28
Gr.Naz.Or.21
(5C 270:11092)
Quasten 3:2426
Camelot 1947,7106;
Bernard 1952,7183
37
because for them "the Holy Scriptures" stood as "the rule and
the measure of every tenet." Yet in the actual presentation of her
argument, as her brother and interlocutor told her, her "exposition, advancing in this consecutive manner, though plain and
unvarnished," had, without any explicit reference to revelation,
borne "the stamp of correctness" and had "hit the truth, by
employing the technical methods of proof and demonstration."
Gregory of Nazianzus drew the contrast in a manner that was
both fair and balanced when he distinguished between "truths
given to faith alone and truths given also to reasonings [tina men
tei pistei doteon monei, tina de kai tois logismois]." As has been
observed, "He does use a type of natural theology, but only on an
ad hoc basis. He does not employ it as an overarching apologetic
that operates without faith."
Yet of the four Cappadocians, it was, as might have been
expected, Gregory of Nyssa whomore than Basil, Gregory of
Nazianzus, or Macrinarepeatedly made explicit the congruence between natural theology as apologetics and natural theology as presupposition, arguing that in a proper statement of
orthodox doctrinein this case the doctrine of the Trinity
there would be a harmony with the presupposed truths to which
a rational theology could also attain: "If someone keeps steadfast
to the sound doctrine, and believes that the Son is of the nature
that is divine without admixture, everything will be seen to be in
harmony with the rest of the truths of religion, namely, that the
Lord is the Maker of all things, and is king of the universe, not set
above it by an arbitrary act of capricious power, but ruling by
virtue of a superior nature," all of these latter "truths of religion"
being truths of Christian revelation, but also in some sense first
principles of rational, natural theology. Athanasius of Alexandria, whom Gregory of Nazianzus celebrated in one of his
most eloquent panegyrics, composed, apparently while in his
twenties, the treatises Against the Heathen and On the Incarnation of the Logos. As Johannes Quasten has pointed out, these
two brief treatises were "in reality two parts of a single work," the
first an exercise in apologetic theology and the second an exercise
in systematic theology. In fact, the points that Athanasius had set
forth as conclusions in the apologetics of the first went on to
become presuppositions to help shape the systematics of the
second. Almost a century earlier, a similar complementarity between apologetic theology and systematic theology had manifested itself, though on a far grander scale, in Origen's two spec-
38
G Naz Or z i
(SC 250:178)
(Jaeger 8-11:89)
Hatch 1957
the opposing case [to antipalon anatrepein]." Nazianzen followed the sequence of "expounding our own, before refuting our
opponents' arguments"; but the exposition of the Cappadocian
system in this book, like that of Nyssen against Eunomius, begins
with the Cappadocians' "refutation [anatrope]" of opposing
views and then follows this with, in his words, "a dogmatic
exposition of our own teaching [ekthesis ton hemeteron dogmaton]." What the subtitle of the entire book is calling "the
metamorphosis of natural theology" is to be seen in the subtle
and complex interactions of this natural theology as apologetics
with this natural theology as presupposition. For in the Classical
systems, natural theology tended to present itself primarily as an
alternativeor even as an antidoteto the cultic practices and
sacred narratives of traditional religious observance. Its principal
expositors were not the official spokesmen for traditional observance, nor the priests of the cult, but lay philosophers and apologists, and sometimes opponents and critics who were skeptics or
agnostics or even atheists.
But at the hands of such thinkers as the Cappadocianswho
were philosophers and apologists and yet at the same time priests
and prelates, but neither opponents nor critics of the orthodox
cultnatural theology underwent a fundamental metamorphosis. It became not only an apologetic but a presupposition for
systematic, dogmatic theology. How well natural theology fared
in such a metamorphosis is a serious historical and theologicalphilosophical question. At least as serious, at any rate for Christian theology, is the question of how the gospel and the dogma
fared in the process. For it can beand has repeatedly been
argued that the concessions and adjustments to the natural theology of Greek culture made in the name of apologetics came back
Bas.tt.2.2z
(SC 305:92)
, ... D
Symb.Nic.-CP
(Alberigo-Jedin 24)
Ba - . .
{SC 17:308)
39
CHAPTER
Owen 1915,64-71
Gottwald 1906,45-47
Armstrong 1985,78
40
T h e Language of Negation
Gr.Nyss.E.2.142-44
1:16667)
Tumarkin 1943,55-71
Gr.Naz.O.38.7
(PG 36:317)
Arist.Mei.980a
Stritzky 1973,79-83
Eun.ap.Gr.Nyss. Eun.
3.7.15 (Jaeger 2:2.20)
: Gr.Nyss.EMK.2.133-34
I (Jaeger 1:264)
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:40)
Gr.Nyss.GJMt.12
(Jaeger 6:357);
Gr.Nyss.EMK. 1.365-69
(Jaeger 1:135-36)
41
"harmless, painless, guileless, undisturbed, passionless, sleepless, undiseased, impassible, blameless, and others like these [to
akakon kai alypon kai aponeron kai atacharon kai aorgeton
aypnon anoson apathes anepilepton kai hosa toiauta]." When
they pertained to the divine nature, he continued, such terms
taught "under what conditions [it was permissible to] conceive of
God as existing." But they did not inform mortals about "the
being of God essentially." Or, in the formula of Gregory of
Nazianzus, drawing on a concept with a long tradition in Greek
philosophy, the only thing that could be comprehended about
the incomprehensible divine nature was its "boundlessness
[apeiria]," what it was not rather than what it was.
Such an abdication of the desire to know, which Aristotle in
the opening sentence of the Metaphysics had called a universal
trait common to all humanity, seemed to fly in the face of the
entire tradition of Greek intellectualism, in which the Cappadocians, too, were so thoroughly steeped. According to Eunomius,
their principal opponent, it seemed to be evidence of sheer ignorance to maintain that "definitions of the terms expressive of
things spiritual" were an impossibility for human beings. In response to that criticism, the Cappadocians sometimes spoke as
though definition by negation, or apophasis, and definition by
affirmation, or cataphasis, were somehow two interchangeable
ways of saying the same thing, so that there would be n o intrinsic
difference between speaking about "goodness" and speaking
about "the absence of evil." But when they came down to specifying their position more strictly, such interchangeability proved
illusory. The question, "The soul is not material, but what is it
positively?" gave the impression that there could be a positive
definition by inclusion, corresponding to the negative definition
by exclusion. But in fact the nature of the soul was an apt illustration of the general rule: "We learn much about many things by
this same method, for by the sheer act of saying that a thing is 'not
so and so,' we by implication interpret the very nature of the thing
in question." As that method was applicable to the soul, and in
some sense even to the material world, so, when "the thing in
question" was not this thing or that thingin fact, not any
"thing" at allbut ultimate reality and pure being itself, it behooved anyone who wanted to think and speak clearly to resort
to the language of negation, heaping up negative terms like "not
['ou' or 'me']" and alpha privatives to eliminate from consideration everything that being was not. Against any and all "fabulous imaginations," then, natural theology was in the first in-
Bas.Etet.2.2
(SC 16:148)
Gr.Nyss.Car.i2
(Jaeger 6:358)
Gr.Nyss.Eww.2.79
(Jaeger 1:250)
Bas.Efet.2.2
(SC 16:148)
Bas..2.9
(SC 305:36)
Gr.Nyss.V.Mos.2
(Jaeger 7-1:92)
Bas.E/7.7
(Courtonne 1:22)
Bas.He;t.2.i
(SC 26:138)
Gn 1:3
Gr.Nyss.Etm.2.246
(Jaeger 1:298)
Bas.EMW.2.4
(SC 305:22)
Ps 18:4
Gr.Nyss.EMtt.2.220 21
(Jaeger 1:289)
Mt3:i7;i7:5
Gr.Nyss.fonz. 2.247-48
(Jaeger 1:298)
N a t u r a l Theology as Apologetics
T h e Language of Negation
See p.220
Gr.Nyss. Eun.z. 265
(Jaeger 1:303-4)
Bas.Sp>.4.6
(SC 17:268)
Bas.EaK.2.7
(SC 305:30)
Bas.Sp*V.6.i3
(SC 17:288)
1 Cor 1:20;
Bas.Sp/r.17.41
(SC 17:391)
Bas.p.l25
(Courtonne 2:3034)
DTC 14:1786-90
Gr.Naz.Of.21.22
(SC 270:156)
Bas.Spir.1.2
(SC 17:151)
43
tionable though its divine inspiration was for all the Cappadocians, was it legitimate to make any such claim, but this language,
too, had been recorded and written "after human fashion." It
was evident from the sacred text itself, moreover, that in its vocabulary for making these declarations that went beyond language, inspired Scripture had "varied its expressions as required
by the occasion, according to the circumstances of the case."
The sensitivity of the Cappadocians to the historical relativity
and semantic ambiguity inherent in all language was responsible
for a certain amount of apparent equivocation on their part
about whether the orthodox Christian theology of the church
had the right to make use of phraseology that had been derived
from such historical development, for exampleto cite the example that was the most crucial one for the purposes of the
present inquiryfrom the development of Greek philosophical
terminology. Sometimes they could seem to urge that theology
had to stick to the terminology of Scripture, and they could, for
example, laud the translators of the Septuagint for not having
rendered into Greek words, but only having transliterated into
Greek letters, such Hebrew terms as "Sabaoth." When they took
that biblicist position, they could speak disparagingly of a "technical terminology" that heretics had foisted on unsuspecting believers to "subvert the simplicity and artlessness of the faith," and
they rejected it as an element "from 'the wisdom of this world'
smuggled into our language." Yet at the same time they could
defend the Council of Nicaea for having introduced the homoousion into its very creed from outside Scriptureand, as they
themselves had to acknowledge, from a heretical source at that,
which made it in some sense even more highly suspect than a
merely philosophical and pagan source would have. In this instance they were quite willing to construe such "technical terminology" as not merely licit but orthodox. Accordingly, they denounced the formula substituted for the homoousion by the
Synod of Seleucia in 359, "similar, according to the Scriptures
[homoion kata tas graphas]," as, despite its biblicist tone, an
evasion intended to deceive the naive. But it was through their
reliance on the language of negation that they were able to overcome this apparent inconsistency in their attitude toward language. On the one hand, they deemed it essential for anyone who
professed theology "to count the terms used in theology as of
primary importance, and to endeavor to trace out the hidden
meaning in every phrase and in every syllable." Yet in the very
44
Gr.Nyss.EMM.2.61
(Jaeger 1:243-44)
Bas.Spir.4.6
(SC 17:270)
Gr.Naz.Or.37.4
(SC 318:278)
Jn 1:1-14
See pp.1034
Gr.Nyss. Eun. 3.2.17
(Jaeger 2:57);
Bas.Spir.6.14
(SC 17:290)
Gr.Nyss.EMM. 3.2.17
(Jaeger 2:57)
Bjerge-Asperger! 1977
N a t u r a l Theology as Apologetics
T h e Language of Negation
process by which the Son as the divine Word was generated from
Father as the divine Mind in the undivided Trinity. The root
metaphor of Father and Son, in turn, was not to be used to imply
"a kind of degradation of the Son in relation to the Father, as
though the Son were in a lower place" and on a lower throne than
the Father. "What could the 'throne' of the immaterial, incomprehensible, and formless Deity be anyway?" the language of
negation could ask, answering that clearly these were "metaphors [ainigmata], containing a meaning deeper than the ob-
Gr.Nyss.Re/.58
tne
(Jaeger 2:335)
Bas.Spm6.15
(sc 17:290)
..
Gr.Nyss.&m. 1.300-301
(Jaeger 1:115)
.. _
,
Gr.Nyss.EKM.1.645
(Jaeger 1:211-12)
Arist.Car.ib;
ns. e .1007a
Bas.5pzr.17.41
(5017:394)
G N
(Jaeger 7-1:22)
XT
Gr.Nyss.Mm.3.6.15
(Jaeger 2:191)
Scheve 1943
VIOUS O n e . "
"
of
There were also some terms which, although they were cataphatic in etymology and in their grammatical form, nevertheless
conveyed unmistakably apophatic connotations. Without itself
being cast in the form of an alpha privative, for example, the
sublime name of the Holy Spirit immediately called to mind an
entire chain of them: "incorporeal, purely immaterial, and indivisible . . . infinite in power, unlimited, unmeasured by times
or aeons [pantos tou asomatou kai katharos aylou te kai amerous . . . apeiron kata dynamin, megethei aperioriston, chronois e aiosin ametreton]." Regardless of whether they were cataphatic or apophatic grammatically, the names used for God, also
in the language of Scripture and of the church, referred to quali-
me 17:322)
45
'
>
46
Gr.Nyss.EMK.1.213
(Jaeger 1:88)
Gr.Nyss.Or.catech.10.4
(Meridier 68)
Gr.Naz.Or.37.4
(SC 318:2.78)
Bas.Hejc.2.2
(SC 26:148)
See pp.16-17,75-76
Gr.Nyss.EM.3.2.io
(Jaeger 2:55)
Gr.Nyss.EMH.3.2.139
(Jaeger 2:97-98)
Bas.Sp(>. 20.51
(SC 17:426-30)
Gr.Nyss.Or.^om.3
(PG 44:1156-61)
N a t u r a l Theology as Apologetics
T h e Language of N e g a t i o n . .
Gr.Nyss.Beaf.2
(PG 44:1209)
Gr.Nyss.Eww.1.554
{Jaeger 1:186)
Gr.Nyss.EMM.1.334
(Jaeger 1:126)
Lampe 892-93
Eph 5:32
Matter 1990
Riedel 1898,66-74
Horn 1925,37879
See pp.8789
Gr.Nyss. Or.dom. 1
(PG 44:1132);
Gr.Nyss. Eun. 1.4 r 8
(Jaeger 1:148)
Bas.EwH.3.6
(SC 305:166)
Ps 88:7
Eccl 5:1
Gr.Nyss. Eun. 2.9394
(Jaeger 1:254)
Gr.Naz.Or.20.5
(SC 270:266)
47
48
Ps 115:2
Gr.Nyss.Varg.io
(Jaeger 8-1:290)
Ex 3:6
Heb 11:8
Gr.Nyss.Ean.2.86-87
(Jaeger 1:252)
2 Cor 12:24
Bas.ffet.2.2
(SC 26:148)
Gr.Nyss.Etm.3.1.16
(Jaeger 2:9)
1 Cor 13:9
Gr.Naz.Or.28.20
(SC 250:140)
Gr.Naz.Or.20.12
(SC 270:82)
1 Cor 13:12
N a t u r a l Theology as Apologetics
the Psalm put it (or at any rate as the Psalm put it in the Greek of
the Septuagint), "I said in my ecstasy [en tei ekstasei mou], 'AH
men are liars!'" This was taken to mean that those who entrusted
to language the task of presenting the ineffable light were "liars,
not because of any hatred on their part for the truth, but because
of the feebleness of this instrument for expressing the very thing
being thought of." Before David, Abraham had likewise been
raised to the summit of sublime knowledge, so that God had even
taken the name " 'the God of Abraham,' as though God were a
discovery of the patriarch." Yet concerning this "acme of human
perfection" it was said in Scripture that at the divine command he
"went away without knowing where he was to go."
After both Abraham and David, Paul in his own ecstasy put
behind him the air and the stars and whatever else was perceptible to the senses. Nevertheless, even there, in "the third heaven,"
Basil's rule that ultimate reality was "inexpressible by the human
voice" prevailed. For that "school above the heavens" was a place
"of silence for every voice conveying meaning by verbal utterance, and of unspoken meditation as the word of instruction,
teaching the purified heart, by means of the silent illumination of
the thoughts, the truths transcending speech." Having been
transported in rapture just as far as any human mind could go,
and much further than any except a select few like Abraham,
Moses, and David had ever been permitted to go, Paul still had to
confess the limits both of knowledge and of speech in the comprehensive disclaimer: "Our knowledge and our prophecy alike are
imperfect [ek merous]." In short, as Gregory of Nazianzus summarized the apophatic interpretation of Paul and of all other
visionaries, using some of these same proof texts from the New
Testament being cited by Gregory of Nyssa: "If it had been permitted to Paul to utter what the third heaven contained, and his
own advance, or ascension, or assumption thither, perhaps we
should know something more about God's nature, if this was the
mystery of the rapture. But since it was ineffable, we will honor it
by silence. This much we will hear Paul say about it, that 'our
knowledge and our prophecy alike are imperfect.'" Even Paul,
he had said in another oration, had to confess to seeing "only
puzzling reflections in a mirror."
In yet another oration, Gregory of Nazianzus pressed this
apophatic critique of the language of religion further still, to
include the very term "God." He was inclined to follow some
schools of Greek thought, both Classical and Christian, in deriv-
T h e Language of Negation
Gr.Naz.Or.30.18
(SC 250:262-64)
Gr.Nyss.Tres dii
(Jaeger 3-1:44)
Gr.Naz.Or.30.18
(SC 250:26264)
See p.42
Gr.Nyss.EwM.1.56871
(Jaeger 1:190-91)
Mt 28:19
See pp.21112
Gr.Nyss.Re/. 14-15
(Jaeger 2:318)
Bas.Spir.6.14
(SC 17:290)
Gr.Nyss.EHK-1.314
(Jaeger 1:120)
Eun.ap.Socr.H.e.4.7
(Hussey 2:482)
Gr.Naz.Or.29.11
(SC 250:200)
Gr.Nyss.V.Mos.2
(Jaeger 7-1:87)
Gr.Nyss.EwH.3.8.8
(Jaeger 2:241)
Jn I : I 8 ; I Tm
6:16;
Ex 33:20
Gr.Nyss.EMK.2.89
(Jaeger 1:252-53)
49
ing the Greek name for "god [theos]" from "theein [to run]" or
from "aithein [to burn]." Gregory of Nyssa, in contrast, suggested: "Godhead [theotes] is so called from 'thea [beholding],'
and the one who is our 'theates [beholder],' by customary use and
by the instruction of the Scriptures is called 'theos.'" But whatever its correct etymology might be, Gregory of Nazianzus insisted, even the word "God" was "still a relative name," not an
"absolute" one. The category of "relative nouns" in Greek grammar, Gregory explained, included not only such obvious nouns of
relationship for God as "Father" or "King," which necessarily
implied the corollary "child" or "subject," but also the noun
"God" itself and all other names for God. Even when commanding baptism "in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy
Spirit," Christ was not specifying "the actual term of signification indicated by the noun 'the name,'" but was referring to "the
unnameable name." Thereby he "gave authority to apply alike to
Father, Son, and Spirit whatever name could be discovered by
human intelligence through the pious effort to indicate the transcendent nature." Behind or beyond this "name" that was not
really a name at all, it was not possible to go.
By contrast, it was characteristic of "foes of thetruth" to "rush
in upon the ineffable." Such was, according to the fifth-century
ecclesiastical historian Socrates Scholasticus, the presumptuous
assertion of Eunomius, the principal opponent of the Cappadocians: "God does not know any more about his own essence than
we do. None of it is known better to him than to us. But whatever
we know about the divine ousia, that precisely is known to God;
and on the other hand, whatever God knows, the same you will
find without any difference in us." An "infatuation" like that
presumed to define the divine ousia, in an enterprise that according to the Cappadocians might become possible, if indeed it ever
would, only in the life everlasting. Therefore, when the language
of religion, not only in natural theology but also in Christian
revealed theology, spoke about "seeing God," what it really
meant was the very opposite, that God could not be seen. That
was evident not only from paganism but also from the Scriptures,
which repeatedly denied the possibility of seeing God. It was
evident as well from the lives of the greatest saints and seers, who,
"beyond every conjecture regarding the divine nature suggested
by any name among all our conceptions of God," found only one
"sure and manifest token of the knowledge of God, namely, the
belief in a God greater and more sublime than any token of divine
knowledge."
Bas.Ep.7
(Courtonne 1:2122)
Bas.Hex.2.2
(SC 26:148)
Gr.Nyss.Beat.6
(PG 44:1264)
Gr.Nyss.Maced.
(Jaeger 3-1:107)
Gr.Naz.Or.27.3
(SC 250:78)
Gr.Nyss.EKM.2.96
(Jaeger 1:254)
Kannengiesser 1967,
55-65
Gr.Naz.Or.28.7
(SC 250:11214)
N a t u r a l Theology as Apologetics
Meyendorff n-12
See pp.i 15-16
See pp.92.-95
c N E
3.8.1 (Jaeger 2:238)
See pp.259-62
,. ,
Bas.Spjr.16.38
(SC 17:376)
n
5i
5*
Symb.Nic.
s TN CP"
(Alberigo-jedin 24)
Rom 8:38-39
Phil 4:7
Gr.Nyss.EBn.1.683
GN^Ct
(Jaeger 6:157)
Gr.Nyss.EHtt.2.154
(Jaeger 1:270)
"' s u P r a c o s m i c intelligence." Thus he connected "all understanding [panta noun]" to "all beings [panta t a o n t a ] . " For it was
the divine ousia itself to which the attribute of "surpassing all
understanding" was most properly applied. Gregory of
Nazianzus, with a quotation of this passage, also asserted that the
comprehension of the transcendent reality of God was "quite
impossible and impracticable, not merely to the utterly careless
and ignorant, but even to the highly exalted," adding: "and in
like manner to every created nature." Having said that, however,
he did go on to qualify his statement by suggesting that the
angels, as "higher natures and purer intelligences, because of
their nearness to God and because of their illumination with the
light of God," might be able to see, "if not the whole, at any rate
more perfectly and distinctly than human beings," and he suggested that this ability might vary among the angels "in proportion to their rank." Yet even this variation among angels, as well
as between angels and human beings, was ultimately a difference
T h e Language of Negation
Gr.Naz.Or.28.4-5
(SC 250:108-10)
Bas.EwM.1.14
(SC 299:220)
See pp.99105
Bas.Hex.1.11
(SC 2.6:134-36)
Gr.Nyss.EH.2.7i
(Jaeger 1:247-48)
Bas.Hex.i.8
(SC 26:118-20)
Gr.Nyss.En.1.330
(Jaeger 1:124)
Gr.Na2.Or.28.5
(SC 250:110)
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PC 46:121)
Soil 1951,298
Gr.Nyss.Or.catech.i
(Meridier 70)
Gr.Nyss.Eww. 1.376
(Jaeger 1:137)
1.2
53
of degree, not of kind, between higher and lower rational creatures. Basil, writing against Eunomius, explicitly identified not
only human understanding but that of "every rational nature" as
being transcended; and to confirm the distinction, he explained,
"When I say 'rational,' I mean by that 'belonging to creation.'"
Although the apologetic intent of the Cappadocians in this
apopbatic analysis was primarily metaphysical and ultimately
theological, one foundation for it was an examination of the
general limitations placed on all natural knowledge even as it
concerned created realities, a direct implication of which could
then be an argumentation a fortiori to the limitations of reason if
it sought to deal with the uncreated God. As was especially evident from Basil's commentary on the creation narrative in the
first chapter of Genesis, a frequent theme in their works was their
reflection upon created realities, on the basis of the available
scientific information. These created realities, even when considered on their own, were "so marvelous as to make the knowledge
of the least of the phenomena of the world unattainable to the
most penetrating mind." Sense-experience of such phenomena as
empirical data left one in no doubt as to their existence, but this
unequivocal repudiation of any empirical skepticism had as its
corollary a profound metaphysical skepticism about the possibility of "comprehending their nature" or of "seeking out
the underlying substance [hypokeimenon]" concealed beneath
them. Nor was it possible or necessary for the theologian, as
someone whose subject matter was the dogmas of the faith, "to
be able to philosophize about the sequence of the realities created
in the cosmogony," as though his theology based on revelation
had made him a scientist or a natural philosopher. Less possible
still was a comprehension of "that [divine] nature above them,
out of which they have sprung"; in dealing with this, speculation
had to fall back once more on such negatives as "nonprehensible
and incomprehensible [aleptos te kai aperileptos]." For such a
comprehension would have required reasoning beyond "the fact
that [hoti]" created realities had come into existence, in order
somehow to grasp "the process how [pos]" that had happened.
That limitation on knowing "the process how" and the consequent restriction to accepting "the fact that" applied in a special
way to the mystery of the incarnation, though not only to it. Even
were it possible for an "ambitious investigator" by some means
to grasp the created world "in its own beginning, whatever that
may be," this would not grant access to that which was "above
it," behind it, and beyond it. It was possible to believe "that God
54
N a t u r a l Theology as Apologetics
is," but it was false to claim that this provided insight into "what
Gr.Nyss.En.2.98
(Jaeger 1:255)
,.
G o d is."
Gr.Nyss.CKH.i. 435-36
(Jaeger 1:153)
See pp.132-34
Mt 11:27
Gr.Nyss.EHK.1.459-60
yaeger 1.159- o)
(SC 299:192)
Gr N E
(Jaeger 1:374)
GrN17 p t>
(Van Heck 22)
6-
'
only for a time on the basis of the everlasting?" A similar metaphysical skepticism applied to another methodology that also
claimed to be reasoning in the opposite direction, this time from
the nature of the Father to the nature of the Son within the Trinity.
Even the attempt to reason from the nature of the Son to the
nature of the Father was attended by great peril, both metaphysical and religious. Yet it at least had some sort of explicit biblical
warrant in such statements of the Gospel as the saying of Jesus,
" N o one knows the Father but the Son and those to whom the
Son chooses to reveal him." But to the Cappadocians the supreme act of theological hybris seemed to be for any theologian
to "presuppose, as more comprehensible, the being of the Father,
and then to attempt to trace and syllogize about the nature of the
Son on the basis of that." At the same time, as was pointed out by
Basil, and then by Gregory of Nyssa quoting the words of Basil in
defense of Basil, this proliferation of negatives was not merely
some kind of rhetorical pleonasm implying that their meanings (or rather nonmeanings) were identical: each negative, by
its exclusion, proceeded by its own "specific application of
thought" and represented a slightly different nuance of "conception [epinoia]" about the apophatic mystery of the divine nature.
Apophatic metaphysics, then, was inseparable from apophatic epistemology, whose fundamental axiom was: "The divine
being is to be known of only in the impossibility of perceiving it."
The divine beingto whom, at Athens in the very first confrontation between Christianity and Classical culture, the apostle
^ a u ^ na< ^ a P P u e d a quotation from a pagan Greek poet, "In him
we live and move, in him we exist"could not be compared with
T h e Language of Negation
Gr.Nyss.w. 1.37375
(Jaeger 1:137)
Gr.Nyss. V.Mos.2
(Jaeger 7-1:86-87)
Bas.Ep.234.1
(Courtonne 3:41-42)
Gr.Nyss.Ew.2.501
(Jaeger 1:372)
See pp.259-60
Gr.Nyss. Beat. 1
{PG 44:1197)
Arist.M^.io28b24
Gr.Nyss. Beat.6
(PG 44:1268);
Bas..i.i2
(SC 299:214)
Rom 11:33
1 Tm 2:4
See pp.32526
Gr.Nyss. Kef. 1617
(Jaeger 2:318-19)
55
any of the other beings to which the terms "being" and "knowing" had ever been applied. In the case of these other beings, a
growth in human knowledge meant an increase in understanding
and comprehending the subject, but here it meant the opposite,
an ever-deepening awareness of the incomprehensibility of the
subject. There were, as the Cappadocians well recognized, implications potential in this epistemology that could unmistakably
lead to nihilism. Basil formulated the first half of a reply to that
potential implication in a letter: "[People ask], 'Do you worship
what you know or what you do not know?' If I answer, 'I worship
what I know,' they immediately reply, 'What is the essence of the
object of worship?' Then, if I confess that I am ignorant of the
essence, they turn on me again and say, 'So you worship you
know not what!' I answer that the word 'to know' has many
meanings. We say that we know the greatness of God, the power
of God, the wisdom of God, the goodness of God, the providence
of God over us, and the justness of the judgment of Godbut not
the very ousia of God." Nor did this mean, as it might seem, that
while no one of these constituted the nature of God, the Deity
could be thought of as "composed of these various elements or
attributes" somehow put together. The human mindand, for
that matter, even the angelic mindcould not, by the exercise of
its reasoning and knowing faculties, attain to the knowledge of
"being itself [to on]," which was, in Aristotle's celebrated formula, "the ancient and persistent and perpetual question, the
eternal conundrum [to palai te kai nyn kai aei zetoumenon kai aei
aporoumenon, ti to on]." In fact, no human faculty was "capable
of perceiving the incomprehensible" ways of God, which ever
remained, according to another Pauline apopbatic formula with
an alpha privative, "unsearchable [anexichniastoi]."
The second half of the response to the accusation of nihilistic
skepticism was somewhat more subtle, and more dependent on
the particularity of Christian revelation. If the God whose will it
was that all should find salvation and come to know the truth had
deemed it necessary for salvation that they should know the divine essence, that would have been revealed; but it had not been
revealed, which proved that such knowledge was not necessary.
What was necessary, however, was that the human memory learn
and retain all the various names under which knowledge of the
divine had come to it; and because it would have been impossible
to keep memory unconfused without the notation of words to
distinguish from one another the things stored in the mind, the
human mind needed such names and words even though the
divine mind did not. The incomprehensibility of divine being and
the unattainability of the transcendent kalon did not imply at all
"a need to despair of winning this object of our love." The imperative was just the opposite: "The more reason shows the greatness of this thing that we are seeking, the higher we have to lift our
.
thoughts
and excite them with the greatness of that object; and
Gr N
v
(Jaeger 8-I.291)
we have to be afraid of losing our participation in the good." If
negation was not to end in nihilism, its corollary had to be a
careful and continuous review of the ways of knowing. "Our
grasping of God," Gregory of Nyssa declared, "would indeed be
easy, if there lay before us one single assigned way to the knowledge of God." Instead, there were many ways to it, not because
the attributes of God were separate or even separable entities, but
because the human mind had to "grope after the ineffable being
,, ., r
. i n diverse and many-sided ways and never pursue the mystery in
r
J
Gr.Nyss.EMM.2.47578
'
'
'
(Jaeger 1:364-65)
the light of one idea alone." This consideration of apopbasis led
Cappadocian thought, therefore, to an examination of the relation between God and the ways of knowing.
CHAPTER
Bas.Hex.z.z
(SC 26:148)
.
ap.Bas.EHK.z.2.4
(SC 305:100)
5
;,..,,
'
,,
Cor
Muhlenberg 1966,
142.-47
nterstem x90i'"
ap.Gr.Naz.Or.27.8
(SC 250:90)
conclusion would be easy, but it would be mistaken. For negative theology could be construed not only as a limitation on the
mind but at the same time as a liberation of the mind, setting the
human reason, as the image of God, free to pursue its speculations within the boundaries that had been set for it. And in fact
the Cappadocian system of epistemology was an ambitious and
daring exploration of the ways of knowing, pushing these ways of
knowing to their limits (and occasionally, perhaps, beyond their
limits) and relating them, though not without the correctives of
the language of apophasis, to the enterprise of natural theology as
a whole. This they did not only in their apologetic works but in
their other writings as well. Gregory of Nazianzus quoted with
n
'
approval the words of his opponent about "different patterns of
life and avocations," which led "to different places according to
58
N a t u r a l Theology as Apologetics
Rom i u t f
Danielou 1957
'^isswurm 1951
Gr.Nyss.EKtt.2.578
(Jaeger 1:395)
Eun.ap.Gr.Nyss. Eun.
3.1.4 (Jaeger 2:4)
Eun.ap.Socr.H.e.4.7
(Hussey 2:482)
Gilson 1944,214-34
Galtier 1946,17579;
Jaeger 1966,101-21;
Girardi 1978,187
Florovsky 4:17
N
(PG 44:197)
.,
(Jaeger 6.64}
Pl.Prr.343b; seep.12.1
Sg 1:8
Prv 13:10
..
tific knowledge, and "knowledge" understood as "the disposition towards the agreeable [he pros to kecharismenon diathesis]," hence as a way of knowing that also encompassed desiring
the object of the knowledge. Certainly for an understanding of
this latter, "subjective" brand of knowledge, but ultimately also
for an accurate and honest accounting of what was involved in
"objective" knowledge, a study that concentrated exclusively on
the world external to the self was insufficient. The safest first step
in the evaluation of every claim to knowledge was to overcome
the ignorance of oneself and to replace it with an accurate knowledge of oneself, which also involved a precise judgment upon
oneself. This self-knowledge, enjoined in the Classical tradition
by the formula of the Delphic oracle, "Know thyself," was the
way of knowing likewise suggested in the Christian tradition by
the words of the Song of Songs, "If you do not know yourself
[Ean me gnois seauten]." Another of the writings attributed to
Solomon, in this case the Book of Proverbs, actually defined "the
wise" as "those who have an accurate knowledge of themselves
[hoi heauton epignomones sophoi]," which in the context of his
citation of this passage Gregory of Nyssa seemed to be taking as a
reference to "the wise" wherever they might appear, whether
among the people of Israel or even among the Greeks, as well as of
Gr.Nyss.Bear.5
(PG 44:12.60)
ivanka 1936,179-80;
eiswurm 1952, 3 - "
Gr.Nyss. Hom.optf.10
(PG 44:152.-53)
.,
_ .,
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
c N H
(PG44:z2.8)
t>f
59
>
mind. Without such preparatory analysis, the danger was, according to Macrina, that one would follow the example of Epicurus and "make our senses [aisthesis] the only means of our
apprehension of things," with the result that the "eyes of the
soul" would be closed to the possibility of "seeing anything in the
world of intelligible and noncorporeal realities [ton noetontekai
6o
Gr.Nyss.Or.cafecfe.5.!
(Meridier 1830)
Gr.Nyss.Hom.opif.z
(PG 44:133)
Gr.Nyss.Ejm. 2. 5 71-74
(Jaeger 1:393-94)
Gr.Nyss.Cant.14
(Jaeger 6:411)
Gr.Naz.Or.28.13
(SC 250:126)
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:33)
Unterstein 1903,7476
Gr.Nyss.EMM.2.182
(Jaeger 1:277)
N a t u r a l Theology as Apologetics
Gr.Nyss.Hom.opif.z
(PG 44:133)
Gr.Nyss. V.Mos.z
(Jaeger 7-1:97)
Bas.Hex.6.11
(SC 16:384)
Bas.Hex.4.5
(SC 26:164-66)
Gr.Nyss. Comm.not.
(Jaeger 3-1:27)
Eun.ap.Gr.Nyss. EMM.
3.1.4 (Jaeger 2:4)
Gr.Nyss. EMM. 2.578
(Jaeger 1:395)
Gr.Nyss.Beat.6
(PG 44:1268)
Unterstein 1903,2527
Gr.Nyss.EMM.2.130
(Jaeger 1:263)
Gr.Nyss. V.Mos. 2
(Jaeger 7 -I:88)
61
theory of epistemology, together with a methodology for extending the borders of the known. The methodology began with a
"first perception," obtainable through the five senses. Yet it was
characteristic of the human mind that it could not be content
with such perceptions but had to press on toward "further discoveries." This it did by prosecuting its inquiry in the direction of
something that it sought to know, though this was still unknown
on purely empirical grounds. Step by logical step, the mind could
construct, by transcendent reflection, a theoretical knowledge
also of "unknown things." This theoretical knowledge, too, had
to be squared with "the first result of our discoveries" in order to
be valid. Thus, by a method of proceeding that was empirical and
yet more than empirical, the inquiry could be gradually conducted "to the end of our proposed research." The "twofold
organization" of the ways of knowing required, therefore, a corresponding twofold recognition. It was a recognition that implied, on the one hand, that there could be a knowledge that was
present in the mind but "not in the eyes," and that therefore the
reasoning mind could sometimes be preferable to the senses as a
guide to truth. For after all, it was reason, not the sense perception shared with other creatures in which those other creatures
sometimes excelled, that was "the distinctive quality" of human
nature. Yet, it also meant that even in the expression of such a
truth obtained by reason, human thought and language were still
compelled to speak "on the basis of metaphor," rather than being
able to claim a knowledge that had been obtained "without the
mediation of the senses [amesos]."
Although a critical analysis of the theory of knowledge and of
the ways of knowing did not yield a perfect parallelism or "natural order" for the treatment of "those things known to us from
above," it was not a waste of time to study them together. For as
there were several ways of knowing "all things actually coming
within our comprehension," the ways of knowing God, too, were
multiple: "Many are the modes [tropoi] of such perception,"
according to the axiom of Gregory of Nyssa. The apologetic
enterprise of Capppadocian thought rested on the presupposition that through these various modes or "tropes" of perception,
reason could "supply us with some comprehension of the divine
nature," albeit "dim and imperfect." For what it was "necessary
to know about God" was not in a direct continuity with "the
things known on the basis of human comprehension." As "the
ousia of God" was unknowable, it was possible, "while holding
6z
Gr.Nyss.Hec.
(PG 44:71)
Bas.Ep.233.2
(Courtonne 3:40-41)
Heb 1:1
Gr.Nyss.EHH.2.475-78
(Jaeger 1:364-65)
Gr.Nyss./n/iaKt.
(Jaeger 3-11:85)
Gr.Nyss.Or.catech.pr.6
(Meridier 6)
Gr.Nyss.V.Mos.i
(Jaeger 7-1:39)
Hb 3:19
Gr.Nyss.Beat.}
(PG 44:1224)
N a t u r a l Theology as Apologetics
in our mind wisdom itself and power itself [ten autosophian kai
ten autodynamin]," to achieve some knowledge of God nevertheless. Because that God was also "truth itself [autoaletheia]," it
was "the primary function of our mind to know one God," but
such knowing was possible only in the sense and to the extent
that the infinitely great could be known by the very small. In sum:
"The judgment of the mind is good and has been given to us for a
good end, namely, the perception of God; but it operates only as
far as it can."
Therefore, it was incumbent on the human mind to "grope for
the ineffable being 'in many and varied ways,' and never to pursue
the mystery in the light of one idea alone; for our grasping of God
would indeed be easy if there lay before us one single assigned
path to the knowledge of God," rather than the many paths made
obligatory by the fragmentary glimpses granted to the limited
human mind. Yet this did not imply a "splitting u p " of the divine
nature itself on the basis of these diverse ways of knowing about
God. From the beauty of the sunlight "the beauty of the real
sunlight" of God could be known, from the solidity of the firmament "the unchangeableness of its Creator," from the immensity
of the heavens "the vast infinity of the power encompassing the
universe"all of these being one and the same divine nature,
simple and uncomposite. In developing an apologetic case "with
an adherent of Greek ideas," whether an atheist or a polytheist,
on the basis of these various ways of knowing, the place to start
was with the logic of theism itself: with the atheist it was desirable
to argue "from the consideration of the skillful and wise economy of the universe" to the acknowledgment of "a certain overmastering power manifested through these channels"; with the
polytheist, the case could be based on the presupposition of the
perfectness of deity, which was patently incompatible with "these
scattered notions of a plurality of gods." God was and remained
the ineffable truth. But by paying attention to these several ways
of knowing it was possible to begin the process, in one sense
subjective and in another sense objective, of following the one of
whom the prophet Habakkuk said, "He sets my feet on the
heights [epi ta hypsela]," toward what was knowable about the
sublime in its transcendence. It was in this sense that Macrina
could come up with the bold proposal, as something correctly
"surmised by our reason," of an analogy between "the speculative, critical, and world-surveying faculty of the soul" as the image of God and "the universal supervision and critical discern-
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:57)
Gr.Nyss. V<Vg.6
(Jaeger 8-1:278)
Gr.Nyss.Hom.opif.zo
(PG 44:197)
Gr.Naz.Or.40.44
(PG 36:42.1)
Bas.E/7.223.3
(Courtonne 3:1213)
Gr.Nyss. Maced.
(Jaeger 3-1:93-94)
Dolger 1932,82-83
Nock 1972,1:36874
Gn 28:12; Mt 1:20
Gr.Nyss.Hom.opif. 13
(PG 44:165-76)
Gr.Nyss. V.Macr.
(Jaeger 8-1:372-735387)
63
(ti.
N a t u r a l Theology as Apologetics
Unterstein 1903,5257
argument for the existence of God when she cited the desire for
arete as "clear evidence against the chronological priority of vice,
before the act of beginning to live," as well as against the related
notion that human nature had derived its source from evil, rather
than "from the sophia of God, in the governance of its economy
over all things." Several times in his Catechetical Oration, Gregory of Nyssa invoked yet another such combination of subjective
and objective arguments when he based his apologetic case on
the testimony of history. "To anyone except a vehement antagonist of the truth," he contended, there was "no slight proof of the
Deity's having sojourned here" within the realm of time and
space. That proof, "exhibited now in this present life before the
beginning of the life to come," consisted of "the testimony borne
by actual facts [dia ton pragmaton auton]." This emphasis of
Gregory of Nyssa on the concrete evidence of "actual facts" was
congruent with his interpretation of how God generally dealt
with the human race, "less by instruction than by what the one
who entered into fellowship with mankind actually did"; for in
the life of Christ "life became a reality." This was a proper apologetic method for the doctrine of creation, which was knowable by
reason, and even for the doctrine of the incarnation, which was
not: "Someone who is looking for proofs of God's selfmanifestation in the flesh must look at the divine actions [energeiai], for one can discover no other demonstration at all of the
existence of the Deity than that which the testimony of those
actions supplies." The same was true also of the divine selfmanifestation in the flesh through the coming of Jesus Christ.
Such evidence came not only from the events actually recorded in
Scripture but from subsequent history as well. For, as he summarized the case elsewhere, "The one who is by nature invisible
becomes visible in the actions of history."
These "subjective-objective" methods of Christian apologetic
argumentation were an important component of what we are
calling in this book the metamorphosis of natural theology, for
they reflected the perspectives, not entirely brand new perhaps
but nevertheless novel in their emphases, that the Christian
worldview brought to the traditional concerns of natural theology. Without radical distortion, these perspectives on natural
theology could even be construed as natural counterparts to the
revealed trinitarian theology so central in the system of the
Cappadocian theologians. Thus the readiness of Gregory of
Nazianzus to argue on the basis of that which was written upon
his own heart, or of Gregory of Nyssa to invoke devout intuitions
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:120)
Gr.Nyss.Or.catecb.18.1
(Meridier 92)
Lenz 1925,5155
Gr.Nyss.Or.cdrec^.3 5.1
(Meridier 160)
Isaye 1937,422-39
See pp.23147
Gr.Naz.Or.40.44
(PG 36:421)
Gr.Nyss. Maced.
(Jaeger 3-1:93-94)
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.'
Atthn.rvs- (PG 46:110)
Gr.Nyss.Beat.6
(PG 44:1169)
See pp.16379
Gr.Nyss.Or.catech.pt.4
(Meridier 4)
Rom 1:20
Bas.HK.i.6
(SC 26:110)
Bas.Hex.3.10
(SC 26:242)
.'.'','
65
66
Bas. Hex.6. n
(SC 16:386)
Pease 1941,163200
Psi8:z
Gr.Nyss.EMM.2.224
(Jaeger 1:290-91)
Ps8:2
Gr.Nyss.Maced.
(Jaeger 3-1:96-97)
Gr.Nyss.V.Mos.2
(Jaeger 7-1:89)
1 Cor 2:18
Gr.Nyss.Beaf.6
(PG 44:12.69)
Gr.Nyss.EHn.2.224
(Jaeger 1:290-91)
Arist.Pfc.241b
Norris 1991,11314
N a t u r a l Theology as Apologetics
later, however, Basil added the warning that it was impossible for
"the whole universe to give us a right idea of the greatness of
God." Paraphrasing this passage from the New Testament in
combination with its Old Testament counterpart, the words of
the psalmist David, "The heavens tell out the glory of God, the
firmament makes known his handiwork," Gregory of Nyssa
could assert what seemed to be the standard cosmological argument in the strongest of possible terms: "The very heavens . . .
all but shout aloud . . . : ' O humanity, when you gaze upon us
and behold our beauty and magnitude, and this ceaseless revolution, with its well-ordered and harmonious motion, working in
the same direction and in the same manner, turn your thought to
the one who presides over our system, and, by the aid of the
beauty that you see, imagine to yourselves the kalon of the invisible prototype.'" Nevertheless, as another psalm made clear, the
words of this psalm really meant something else: "Although 'the
heavens tell out the glory of God,' they are counted poor heralds
of the worth of God, because the majesty of God is exalted, not as
far as the heavens, but 'high above those heavens [hyperano ton
ouranon].'" And so what the heavens were telling, according
to David, was the unknowability of God, that God was "the
unknown and the uncontemplated [to agnoston te kai atheoreton]." The subtlety and the ambiguity of the witness of the works
to the Maker also implied that it was presumptuous in the extreme to claim to be able to "settle questions about the works of
God by means of the nature of the worker." In spite of that, there
did remain the possibility of a natural theology, if it was possible
"perhaps for the 'wise by the standards of this age,' too, to gain
some knowledge of the transcendent wisdom and power from the
beautiful harmony of the cosmos."
As was evident from the reference to "this ceaseless revolution,
with its well-ordered and harmonious motion, working in the
same direction and in the same manner," this cosmological argument put special emphasis on the argument from motion.
Throughout most of its history, the argument from motion has
been based on Aristotle's classic axiom in the seventh book of the
Physics: "Everything that is in motion must be moved by something." Gregory of Nazianzus, responding to Aristotle's identification of God as a "fifth element" alongside the traditional four
stoicheia, asked: "What is the force that moves your 'fifth element,' and what is it that moves all things, and what moves that,
and what is the force that moves that?" And if an infinite regress
. . _ . .
Gr.Naz.Or.28.8
(SC 250:116)
D
Bas.Hex.1.8-9
(SC 26:120-22)
..
6j
'
'
would reel," as an argument for the existence of God. Gregory of
Nyssa refined the argument by introducing a distinction among
the kinds of motion. Earth, he said, was "the place of variation
and flux." But the case was different with the things that appeared moving in heaven, because they did not behave in such a
way. Instead, it was characteristic of the motion of "all heavenly
things" to "move in their own courses in series of orderly sequence [eirmoi kai taxei kai akolouthiai pros ton idion
Cr.Nyss.Beat.8
(PG 44:1292)
dromon]." Despite the contrast between the flux on earth and the
orderly sequence in the heavens, it remained the case that also in
heaven there was "nothing moving of its own proper motion";
what was evident in the motion of the heavens no less than in
motion on earth was "the dependence of everything visible, or
ment of the seasons, and of day and night, all bore witness to that
even conceivable, on inscrutable and sublime power." The movepower, transcendent beyond all motion or change.
Although Thomas Aquinas made "the argument from motion
the first and more manifest way" of demonstrating the existence
of God, his second way was "from the notion of efficient cause."
Both in the argument from motion and in the argument from
cause, moreover, it was the impossibility of positing an infinite
regress that was seen as clinching the case, so that then God could
be identified as the prime unmoved mover or as the first uncaused
cause. Gregory of Nyssa took this conception of the first cause to
be "a proposition superfluous to prove," because he was confident that it was undeniable by "anyone with even a little insight
into the truth of things," whether Greek or Jew or Christian. This
was therefore a first principle of natural theology: "Everyone
agrees that the universe is linked to one first cause [homologeitai
para panton mias aitias exephthai to pan]; that nothing in it owes
its existence to itself, so as to be its own origin and cause; but that
there is on the other hand a single uncreated eternal nature, the
same forever, which transcends all our ideas of distance." In
discussing the first cause, Gregory probed the metaphysical
meaning of the term "Father" as applied to God, in the sense of
"the causality [ton aition] of all beings"; "for if," he argued,
"there had been some further cause transcending the Father, it
would not have been proper to use the name 'Father,' because that
title would have to be transferred higher, to this presupposed
cause." Causation was a natural and rational category under
G N
Gr.Naz.0.6.15
(Jaeger 1:290-91)
{PG 35:741)
Thos.Aq.s.Ti.2.3
if N . ,
(Jaeger 3-11:76-77)
N F
(Jaeger 1:184-85)
68
N a t u r a l Theology as Apologetics
Gr.Nyss.Eww.3.2.129:
(Jaeger 1:94)
Gr.Nyss.EwK.i.137
(Jaeger 1:265)
Gilson 1966,76
Gr.Nyss.EwM. 2.158
(Jaeger 1:270-71)
Bas.Efec.1.1
(SC 16:86)
Gr.Nyss.Jn/aMf.
(Jaeger 3-11:71)
See pp.16061
Gr.Nyss.EMK.L526
(Jaeger 1:178)
Gr.Nyss.Ewn.2.222
(Jaeger 1:290)
Bas.Hex.7.4
(SC 26:412)
Macr a Gr N ss
Anim.res. {PG 46:24)
See pp.96-99
H
(SC 26:104-6)
.T
..
Gr.Naz.Or.28.6
(SC 250:112)
See pp.127-29
See pp.40-56
,'
.'''.'
69
God transcended all thought and language. All apologetic argumentation for the existence of God, like the optimistic view of the
image of God as reason that underlay such argumentation, was
sharply qualified by the severe stipulations of Cappadocian apophatic theology. Awareness of the paradox was responsible in
Cappadocian apologetics for a dialectic between an apophatic
doctrine of divine transcendence that emphasized, far more radically than Thomism did, what Thomas Aquinas called the "via
eminentiae," and a doctrine of analogy that also was, in many
respects, more radical than the Thomistic one.
The "via eminentiae" was fundamental to the Cappadocian
version of natural theology. As Auguste-Joseph Gaudel has summarized it, "To the doctrine of Eunomius, according to which the
notion and the term 'agennetos [unoriginated]' are the only
proper representations of the divine essence, the Cappadocian
fathers reply with a doctrine of the divine names that is completely the opposite. As a consequence of divine incomprehensibility, which is based on the fullness of the first cause and on our
own mode of knowing, we are not able to conceive of God hv
;C
DTC 4:2428
Geyer 1960,437
Pl.Smp.2ioe-nib
..
_. , ,
Gt.Nyss.Or.catecb.1.1
(Mgridier 16)
Ps 103:24
VT
C.r.Nyss.Beflt.6
(PC 44:1268-69)
Burrell 1973,142
ally. Elsewhere he elaborated on these "many modes of perception." For example, it was possible, "by way of inference
[stochastikos] through the sophia appearing in the universe, to
see the one who 'made all things by sophia.'" A similar process of
inference could be applied to "all other things elevating the mind
to transcendent goodness," which thus became "apprehensions
of God," because each of these sublime meditations placed God,
in some sense, within human sight. Among these apprehensions
of God available through the "via eminentiae" were: "power,
purity, constancy, freedom from contariety," all of which could
"engrave on the soul the impress of a divine and transcendent
mind."
Gr.Nyss..3.6.74-7J
(Jaeger 2:2.12)
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:92)
Gr.Nyss. V.Mos.i
(Jaeger 7-1:3)
Gr.Nyss. Virg. 11
(Jaeger 8-1:293-94)
ap.Pl.Tfa.176b
Gr.Nyss. Cant.15
ger 6:439)
Gr.Nyss. Hex. pr.
(PG 44:61)
Gr.Nyss. Or.dom. 2
(PG 44:1140)
Gr.Nyss. Beat.6
(PG 44:1269-72)
Wis 13:5
'
71
provement"; but because of its perfection, the Godhead was different from the creation, not only quantitatively but qualitatively.
Each stage of created good pointed beyond itself to a higher stage,
more nearly approximating the perfect good; but God, as that
perfect good, was "a nature surpassing every conceivable idea of
the good and transcending all other power, being in no need of
anything outside itself definable as good, and thus in itself the
plenitude of every good [ton agathon ousa to pleroma]." Therefore, although it was, in the fullest sense of the word, correct to
regard "every good as by its very nature unlimited," it was an
obvious characteristic of the so-called perfection of the empirical,
natural world that it was bounded by limits; the true good, therefore, was the negation of any of the goods known here and now.
All the goodness and beauty of the cosmos were nothing more
than "a hand to lead us to the preeminent beauty." Socrates had
taught: "We ought to fly away from earth to heaven as quickly as
we can; and to fly away means to become like God, as far as this is
possible; and to become like him means to become holy, just, and
wise." So it had to be, according to the Cappadocians, not only
with holiness, justice, and wisdom, but with every created and
therefore imperfect quality of human nature, whose perfection
was to be found in God alone. Every human power, Gregory of
Nyssa warned as he opened his exposition of the creation narrative, was to be transcended by the appeal to its perfection. All that
moved and changed in the world, and beyond it in the stars with
their "orderly array [diakosmesis]," found its perfection only in
the eminence of "the stable nature, the immovable power, existing in its own right."
Nevertheless, this emphasis on the preeminence and transcendence of all the qualities of the divine mind over the human mind,
far from producing "despair of ever beholding the desired object," did make possible an exploitation of the possibilities of
thinking about God by means of analogy. That enterprise received a license, indeed an imperative, from the statement of the
Wisdom of Solomon: "The greatness and beauty of created
things gives us an idea of their Creator through analogy"the
only passage in the Greek Bible, whether Old or New Testament,
where this adverbial form "through analogy [analogos]" appeared. The willingness of the Cappadocians to resort to analogies was in part a response to the contemptuous way in which
Eunomius treated the practice of "ascribing homonyms, drawn
from analogy, to human thought and conception," which he
dismissed as "the work of a mind bereft of all judicial sense,
72-
N a t u r a l Theology as Apologetics
Eun.ap.Gr.Nyss. Eun.
2.306 (Jaeger 1:316)
Gr.Nyss. Comm.not.
(Jaeger 3-1:27)
Gr.Naz.Or.31.10
(SC 250:294)
Bas.Sp*V.26.6i
(SC 17:466)
Gr.Nyss. Cant. 1
(Jaeger 6:36-37)
Gr.Nyss.Cani.13
(Jaeger 6:385-86)
Gr.Nyss. Infant.
(Jaeger 3-11:85)
Gr.Nyss.Ref. 1
(Jaeger 2:312)
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:2124)
73
a
if,
single uncreated eternal essence, the same forever, which tran(jaeger 3-11:76-77)
scends all our ideas of distance." Yet they reserved their sharpest
KT .,
. polemics for those who claimed to know the secret being of God
G N
Gr.Nyss.cwtt. 1.435-36
(Jaeger 1:153)
_6
(Jaeger 1:159-60)
G N
CH A P T E R 5
The Many and the One
Gr.Nyss.wM.2.578
(Jaeger 1:395)
Gr.Nyss.B<?#r.6
(PG 44:1168-69)
Gr.Nyss.Re/'.2.4
(Jaeger i : 3 i i - 2 z [var.])
Gr.Nyss.n.z.475-78
(Jaeger 1:364-65)
The Cappadocians recognized that in any speaking about knowledge it was necessary to acknowledge a multiplicity of ways of
knowing in general, and that in speaking specifically about the
knowledge of God it was necessary to acknowledge a plurality of
"modes of perception" of a "nature above every nature, a nature
invisible and incomprehensible." But this recognition carried
with it the potential danger that such multiplicity and plurality
could be interpreted as being applicable also to the object of
knowing, not only to the process of knowing. Therefore, they
emphasized "the contrast between the One and the many, between the true and the false, between so-called gods and the one
true God." Gregory of Nyssa admitted that because there was not
only "one single assigned path to the knowledge of God" but a
variety of paths, depending on which of the divine attributes was
being pursued, someone might conclude that "the splitting up of
such attributes" implied the "splitting up of the subject of the
attributes"; he accompanied this admission with strong disavowals that he and his orthodox colleagues could be charged
with doing anything of the kind by their trinitarian distinctions
among the three divine hypostases within the single divine ousia..
It was, however, he surmised, some such process of pluralistic
reasoning about immanent realities that had been at work in the
history of religions:
"Seeing that [the pagans], with their untrained and narrow
intelligence, were disposed to look with wonder on the beauties
74
T h e M a n y and the O n e
Gr.Nyss.EMM.3.3.5
(Jaeger 2:108-9)
Ras.Leg.lib.gent.4
(Wilson 22)
Gr.Nyss.EMM.3-2.94
(Jaeger 2:83)
Gr.Nyss.EHH.3.9.59
(Jaeger 2:286)
Seepp.300-305
Gr.Naz.Or.39.3-6
(PG 36:336-41)
Gr.Naz.Or.36.3
(50318:246)
75
y6
Gr.Nyss. ViVg. 3
(Jaeger 8-1:265-66)
Gr.Naz.Or.28.15
(SC 250:132)
Gr.Nyss. Gzwr.7
(Jaeger 6:205)
Gr.Naz.Or.28.14
(SC 250:130)
Bas.p.233.i
(Courtonne 3:39)
Gr.Naz.Or.39.7
(PG 36:341)
Lefherz 1958,33-59
Gr.Naz.Or.40.17
(PG 36:381)
Gr.Nyss. V.Macr.
(Jaeger 8-1:404)
Rom 12:1
Dolger 1932,81-116
Delehaye 1921,31432
Gr.Naz.Or.24.12
(^0284:64-66)
Gr.Nyss. Eun. 3.10.40-41
(Jaeger 2:305)
Gr.Nyss.Tres dii
(Jaeger 3-1:39)
N a t u r a l Theology as Apologetics
shocking extravagance, such as murders and the eating of children, murders of husbands, murders of mothers and brothers,
and incestuous unions."
Idolatry was, therefore, the perversion of the desire for God.
That desire was in itself natural, noble, and divinely created, but
idolatry abused "the kalon to an evil purpose [to kakon]." In this
sense it was correct to interpret idolatry as a symptom of "ignorance of the knowledge of the true God." It was " ignorance of the
first nature" that prompted idolaters to "follow the traditional
honor [to images] as lawful and necessary." For when the human
mind, instead of "assenting to its diviner part" as by nature it was
intended to do, remained "alone and unaided," it began to substitute "monstrous fancies" for "its proper judgment" and therefore to conclude that so useful a product as wood was "no longer
wood but a god," and that gold was no longer a medium of
commercial exchange but "an object of worship." Such practices
were best left to "the amusement of the children of the Greeks
and of the demonic authors of their folly, with their diversion of
the honor of God to themselves." That sense of abhorrence at the
practices and myths of paganism was intensified if Christians
themselves were still being observed resorting to "amulets or
incantations, those instruments for the devil to come in and steal
worship from God." Yet, it was seen not as superstition but as
authentic Christian piety and an authentic component of "the
worship offered by rational creatures" for Macrina to preserve
fragments of the true cross and to wear a pendant and a ring
containing them. Therefore, the charge that Cyprian, one of the
orthodox fathers of the church, had been a sorcerera charge
stemming from the mistaken identification of the Christian martyr Cyprian of Carthage with the pagan sorcerer Cyprian of
Antiochhad to be taken with great seriousness. Conversely, it
was a grave charge against a heretic to attribute to him an affinity
for paganism and superstition. And in the systematic articulation
of Christian orthodoxy, above all in the formulation of the
church's dogma of the One and the Three in the Holy Trinity, it
was obligatory at all costs for the interpreters of the orthodox
doctrine, despite the superficial resemblances, "to avoid the appearance of any similarity with Greek polytheism." The apostle
Paul disavowed any such similarity in his declaration: "Even
though there be so-called gods, whether in heaven or on earth
and indeed there are many such gods and many such lordsyet
for us there is one God, the Father, from whom are all things, and
we exist for him; there is one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom
i Cor 8:56
Bas.p.8.3
(Courtonne 1:25)
Ps?5:5
Gr.Nyss.Ref.z4
(Jaeger 2:321-2.2.)
Gr.Nyss.ItHM.3.2.94
(Jaeger 2:83)
Jaeger 1947,4-9;
Jaeger 1961,3 m
Hom.H.15.189
Gr.Naz.Or.31.16
(SC 250:306)
Gr.Nyss.EwM.2.61819
(Jaeger 1:407)
Gr.Naz.Or.29.2
(SC 250:178)
Gr.Naz.Or.4.117
{SC 309:280)
Jaeger 1961,29
77
78
N a t u r a l Theology as Apologetics
Pl.Tim.39e-4ia
Cr.Nyss.Ref.4S
(Jaeger z:3 3 2)
Cooke 1927,400401
Schippers 1952,46-48
OCD 41415;
ODCC 480
Gr.Naz.Or.28.14
(SC 250:130)
Gr.Naz.of.21.36
(SC 270:188)
Cr.Nyss.Apoll.
(Jaeger 3-1:228-29)
Gr.Naz.Or.14.29
(PG 35:896)
Gr.Naz.Or.38.6
(PG 36:316-17)
Gr.Naz.Or.39.7
(PG 36:341)
Gr.Nyss. Cant. 5
(Jaeger 6:147)
Gr.Nyss. Cant.y
(Jaeger 6:205)
Gr.Nyss. Or.catech.pr.4
(Meridier 4)
Bas.fip.189.34
(Courtonne 2:134-35)
Gr.Nyss.V('rg.7
(Jaeger 8-1:283)
Gr.Naz.Or.25.15
(SC28 4 :i92)
See pp.1013,170-71
Gr.Naz.Or.42.3
{PG 36:461)
Gr.Naz.Or.5.32
(SC 309:356-60)
OCD 999
Bas.Hex.5.1
(SC 26:280)
Cochrane 1944,285
Gr.Naz.Or.28.14
(SC 250:128)
79
8o
Lk 22:53
2 Cor 4:4
jn i4:3o;i6:n
Portmann 1954,1048;
Philippou 1966,251-56
Bring 1929
.. _.
Gr.Nyss.isHM.2.277
(jaeger 1:307-8)
r r
Gn 1:2
,,
_
(sc 26:152-60)
.,
np.Gr.Nyss.Or.catecb.7.1
(Meridier44)
as the origin of the tendency to misery in our nature"; this implied that it was necessary to protect the integrity of God against
the implications of the problem of evil by positing a second god.
Whatever its motivation, any such theory of "two opposite principles" that were different "both in nature and in will" but equal
in power, and any such picture of "a drawn battle because of the
r
J
r
'
inexhaustibleness of their powers," posed a basic threat to the
doctrine of creation, and still more fundamentally to the very
doctrine
say so, natural
of the theology
oneness ofwas
God.
sounder
Paradoxical
when itthough
reasoned
it seemed
from evil
to
r. ., c
Gr.Nyss.tMM.1.5037
(Jaeger 1:171-73)
rr
>
T h e M a n y and the O n e
Gr.Nyss.Eim.2.477
(Jaeger 1:365)
Vollert 1897,3655
Seepp.324-26
Bas.EHK.2.34
(SC 305:140)
Gr.Naz.Or.28.14
(SC 250:12830)
Gr.Nyss.V.Mos.i
(Jaeger 7-1:22)
Gr.Nyss.n. 1.626- 28
(Jaeger 1:206-7)
See pp.92-93
Gr.Nyss.K.3.4.34
(Jaeger 2:147)
81
8z
Gr.Nyss.Re/".2.4
(Jaeger 2:321-22 [var.])
Gr.Nyss.w. 2.130
(Jaeger 1:263)
Is 44:6
Gr.Nyss.Eun.3.3.10
(Jaeger 2:110)
See pp.11518
Koperski 1936,4565
Jn 10:30
Gr.Nyss.EHM.3.9.1021
(Jaeger 2:271)
Gr.Naz.Or.25.16
(SC 284:194-96)
N a t u r a l Theology as Apologetics
One and the many, between the true and the false, between socalled gods and the one true God." For the Cappadocians as
Christian believers and as theologians of the orthodox church,
monotheism was guaranteed by a testimony whose authority
they regarded as far more reliable than the "dim and imperfect
comprehension of the divine nature" provided by reason. That
testimony was contained in countless affirmations both of Sacred
Scripture and of Christian tradition. Speaking through the
prophet Isaiah, God had declared: "I am the first, and hereafter
am I, and no god was before me, and no god shall be after me."
With such authority behind it, monotheism was beyond all question. It was from "this inspired utterance spoken by the mouth of
the prophet," Gregory of Nyssa affirmed on the basis of this
passage, that there came "the doctrine of the divine nature as one,
continuous with itself." For these words of Isaiah meant: "That
which is after God is the creation, and that which is anterior to
God is nothingness, and nothingness is not God; or one should
rather say, that which is anterior to God is God in his eternal
blessedness, defined in contradistinction to nothingness [pros
ouden orizomenos]." For God transcended all notions of "before" and "after," and therefore time itself. Writing against the
same opponent, Nyssen went on to clarify what the oneness of
God meant in the orthodox tradition. The saying of Christ, "The
Father and I are one," proved that despite "the signification of
not being coupled with anything else" that the word "one" carried in the ordinary system of counting, even that could not be
used to "separate the Father from the Son." The one single "Godhead (theotes]" was common to Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
Nothing, and certainly not the church's orthodox dogma of the
Trinity, could be permitted to compromise the absoluteness of
monotheism, although it did eventually compel the Cappadocians to posit a basic redefinition of divine oneness.
Seepp.245-47
T h e M a n y and the O n e
Bas.p.2.33.l
(Courtonne 3:40-41)
c
-a -E
Eun.ap.Bas.r.wM.1.5
(sc 299:170)
..
(SC 2J0.304)
Gr.Nyss.EwH.3.9.59
(Jaeger 2:286)
^ IT i9n f 'f
Gr.Nj'ss.ftf/.48
(Jaeger 1:332)
DTC 7:620
OED 5-1:223
See pp.259-62
Coil 1:16
r r
[theoteta]," despite their having had "many gods, not one." Although not strict monotheists in the biblical and Christian sense,
therefore, these Classical Greek thinkers did postulate "one great
god of some sort, pre-eminent above the rest," in relation to
whom there were "some subject powers, differing among themselves in the way of superiority or inferiority, in some regular
order and sequence, but all alike subject to the supreme
[power]." Plato, for example, was read as having, in the Timaeus,
asserted the existence of "a Maker and Creator of certain subordinate gods."
Such language about "subject powers" and "subordinate
gods" in relation to a "Maker and Creator" who was "supreme"
suggested that not "monotheism" but "henotheism" (a term that
appears to have been a nineteenth-century coinage) might be the
best designation for the doctrine of God, and of the gods, that the
Cappadocians claimed to have found in the Greek philosophical
tradition. Yet this problem of the metaphysical relation between
the supreme Deity and subordinate powers was not confined to
polytheistic pagans. It appeared within the Cappadocian system
of natural and revealed theology itself, in connection with
their doctrine of angels. There were evidentand troubling
parallels between Judeo-Christian angelology and pagan polytheism. The conventional division by the Cappadocians of all
reality between the world perceived by the senses and the world
perceived by the mind did line up, on one side of the boundary
marked by that distinction, the entire physical cosmos including
the human body, and on the other side of the boundary marked
by that distinction, not only God but other spiritual beings, as
belonging to the realm of timeless spirit. The apostle Paul himself
drew such a distinction between "things visible" and "things
invisible." On the basis of that Pauline distinction, Gregory of
Nyssa proposed a grand schematization of "the things cognizable by the senses" as one category, and "the intelligible [noetos]
84
Gr.Nyss.EHx.3.3.2
(Jaeger 2:107-8)
Mateo-Seco-Bastero
1988,269-84
world" as the other category. But then within this latter category
; he asserted a distinction that was ontologically even more basic:
"the things that have been made in the way of creation" versus
: "the existence that is above creation." It was into the class of
intelligible but created existence that Paul in that same passage
had put "thrones or dominions or rulers or powersall things
have been created"; they had been "created," Gregory explained,
by one who stood above all of creation, whether visible or invisible. Therefore he went on to argue that "the interval dividing and
; fencing off uncreated from created nature" was metaphysically
"wide and insurmountable," so much so that only the language
of apophasis was appropriate in speaking about that which was
"transcendent over all notion of degree," admitting neither arche
nor telos and experiencing "neither addition nor dirninution."
Thus, while it was legitimate to employ such terms as "uncreated
intelligible nature" (God) and "created intelligible nature" (angels and the human soul) in contradistinction to "visible and
empirical nature" (the physical universe and the human body),
the more important distinction by far for "our conception of
existences" was that between "the creation [whether visible or
invisible] and the uncreated nature" of the one true God. Ultimately only that distinction was consistent with authentic monotheism.
In some passages that appeared in their writings the Cappadocians did give the impression that in speaking about this oneness
of God, especially in connection with the trinitarian doctrine,
they were applying to the doctrine of God a generalized Platonic
system of universals, and that the universal "deity [theotes]" was
that shared by Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. This came in response to the argument of certain heretics, who reasoned: "Peter,
James, and John, being in one human nature, are nevertheless
called three men, and there is no absurdity in describing those
who are united in nature, if they are more than one, by the plural
number of the name derived from their nature." Therefore, so the
argument of the heretics continued, it would, by a similar reasoning, be acceptable to refer to Father, Son, and Holy Spirit as
"three gods." But it was in fact, Gregory of Nyssa replied, a
catachresis even to use the plural "three men [treis anthropoi]" in
speaking about Peter, James, and John; for although there were
"many sharing in the nature," what they sharednamely, "humanity [anthropos]"was'still one. In arguing that way, he
could be construed as maintaining that it was nothing more grave
than a similar "imprecision of language" to speak of Father, Son,
T h e Many and t h e O n e
Gr.Nyss.Tres dii
(Jaeger 3-1:40)
Bethune-Baker 1901
Gr.Nyss.M.1.231-32
gert:94-95)
Quasten 2:57-62
Gr.Nyss.Eww. 3.2.17
(Jaeger 2:57)
Gn 1:1
Jn 1:1
Gr.Nyss.Ewn. 3.6.33
(Jaeger 2:226)
See pp.6668
85
and Holy Spirit as "three gods," because, like Peter, James, and
John, the three divine hypostases shared in one nature, "deity
[theotes]." Thus, they could be accused of having salvaged monotheism by resort to the abstractions of the Platonic doctrine of
ideas and of having equated the oneness of God, the most fundamental confession of biblical faith, with a philosophical theory
borrowed from Hellenism. Although that would be a drastically
reductionist way of reading the trinitarian monotheism of the
Cappadocians and therefore a radical oversimplification of their
profound and complex position, it is nevertheless correct to say
that monotheism was, in their judgment, a valid philosophical
theory based on reason, not only a valid biblical tenet based on
revelation. Monotheism was a necessary rational inference from
the rational principles of apophasis. "The impossibility of conceiving of the viewless, formless, and sizeless as multiform and
composite" was a corollary of apophatic theology to which even
the unlettered and naive would have to assent.
It was indispensable to this monotheism that there be only one
single arche for all reality. As applied to God, the term arche was
familiar not only from the works of centuries of Classical philosophers but also from the writings of Greek Christian theologians,
above all of Origen in the title of his most brilliant speculative
work, On First Principles, called Peri Archon in Greek. It was
sanctioned through its appearance in the first sentence of the
Septuagint version of the Old Testament, and then in the first
sentence of the Gospel of John in the New Testament. Nevertheless, the Cappadocians found it imperative to interpret even this
venerable biblical, philosophical, and theological term by means
of apophasis; for both arche and telos were "terms for limits of
extension," so that because, in the case of God, there was no
extension, there could be no limit either. Only on that basis could
even a Greek term with such impressive credentials, both Classical and Christian, as arche be said to apply to a "divine nature
without extension and with no limit." Commenting on the first
verse of the Bible, Basil cataloged the several meanings of the
word arche in both biblical and Classical usage: "The first movement was called arche. . . . Again, we call arche the essential and
first part from which a thing proceeds, such as the foundation of
a house. . . . Often even the good that is the final cause is the
arche of actions." In any of these senses, it was "ridiculous to
imagine a beginning of a beginning." And, in keeping with the
rejection of the notion of an infinite regress, it followed: "If we
divide the arche into two, we make two instead of one, or rather
86
Bas.rfec.1.5-6
(SC 26:108-10)
Gr.Naz.Or.z5.16
{SC 284:194)
See pp.23841
Gr.Nyss.EwM.1.48386
(Jaeger 1:166-67)
Gr.Nyss.Ezm.r.418
(Jaeger 1:148)
Ps 78:5-6
Gr.Naz.Or.31.22
(SC 250:316-18)
Gr.Naz.Or.25.17
(^0284:198)
Gr.Nyss.Maced.
(Jaeger 3-1:91)
Gr.Naz.Or.6.12
(PG 35^737)
Gr.Nyss.Apoll.
(Jaeger 3-1:228-29)
Gr.Nyss. Maced.
(Jaeger 3-1:93-94)
Viller-Rahner 1990,
12246; Blond 1944,
157-210; Keenan 1950,
167207
Florovsky 10:139-48
Morison 1912,1521;
Clarke 1913,63106
Quasten 3:26972
Gr.Nyss. Virg.
(Jaeger 8-1:147-343)
Gr.Naz.O.38.6
(PG 36:316)
Gr.Naz.Or.37.4
(SC 318:278)
87
N a t u r a l Theology as Apologetics
N _
(SCz5o:z88)
See PP.Z91-93
r. yss an 7
"
(Jaeger 6:213)
Gr.Nyss.Hom.opif.iz
I* v,44'2^5
(jaeger 6:2.13)
Eph 3:14-15
Gr Naz o
6
(sc 284:196)
J?1.''*
Gr.Naz.Or.29.2
(sc 250:180)
..
Gr.Nyss.<<.1.548
(Jaeger 1:184-85)
K.
..
Gr.Nyss.EMM.2.419
(jaeger 1:348)
Seepp.218-19
1 Chr 24:31517:22;
2Chr i9:8;z3:2o;26:i2;
? I9 I
1
' .g.
Heb 7:4
>
>
>
used here in a unique sense. Therefore, the real metaphor was not
at all in the use of the name "Father" for God but in the applica; tion of such a term to human procreation and to human fatherhood, which was always one in a series of fatherhoods and of
'
'
sonships. Yet, that metaphor did not in the least inhibit, but in
fact facilitated, ascribing to a genderless Deity the qualities not
only of a transcendent fatherhood but of a transcendent motherhood: "The divine power . . . , though exalted far above our
nature and inaccessible to all approach, like a tender mother who
joins in the inarticulate utterances of her babe, gives to our human nature what it is capable of receiving; and thus in the various
manifestations of God to humanity, God both adapts to human"
ity and speaks in human language." Both this free use of the
maternal metaphor and this severe limitation on the paternal
metaphor came from Gregory of Nyssa, and from the same treatise; they were paralleled, in his writings and in those of the other
Cappadocians, by the ease in moving back and forth between the
masculine title Logos and the feminine title Sophia for Jesus
.
. ,
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
Christ as the second hypostasis of the Trinity. Despite the use
of the post-Classical title "patriarch [patriarches]," which appeared in some seven passages in the Septuagint and then was
employed four times in the New Testament, it would be a draconian misreading of their thought to attribute to the Cappadocians what is sometimes labeled a "patriarchal" vision of deity, as
though God were the projection of maleness writ large. For their
theological understanding of both of the components of that
word"pater" and "arche"was the affirmation of a divine
nature
that transcended
gender, together
with all
othertoo,
anthropomorphic
and anthropopathic
images. Thus
gender,
was
Gr.Nyss.Re/".24
an index of "the contrast between the One and the many, between
the true and the false, between so-called gods and the one true
God." But this apologetic monotheism was challenged and therefore deepened when it became a presupposition in the Cappadocian defense of the orthodox dogma of the Trinity.
CHAPTER
Gr.Naz.Or.39.7
(PC 36:341)
(PG 35:896)
See pp.285-86,295
% If'4
(Jaeger 6:147)
C N - - O 86
(PG 36:316-17)
Pease 1 9 4 1 , 1 6 3 2 0 0
D
The doctrine of God rendered the apologetic rejection of polytheism of supreme importance in the Cappadocian system of
thought. Even apart from its destructive implications for prayer
and spirituality, through which, in the words of Gregory of
Nazianzus, worshipers were "disgraced by the objects of their
worship" rather than ennobled as they should have been, polytheism was to be repudiated because it presented a distorted
picture of divine reality. Its corrupting effect on human morality
was likewise inseparable from its deadly combination of irrationality and blasphemy. In a grotesque counterpart to the sublime process of theosis, through which those who worshiped the
true God came to "share in the very being of God," idolaters
became copies of the idols they worshiped. The immorality of the
gods on Mount Olympus was mirrored in the immorality of the
human feasts and festivals in their honor. Both corollaries of
polytheism, the devotional and the ethical, were essential components of the apologetic case of the Cappadocians. So, too, was the
cosmological corollary of polytheism. Already under the rubric
of natural theology as apologetics, therefore, polytheism also
represented an unacceptable subversion of the idea of the world
as
^1
11
Bas.hp.189.34
(Courtonne 2:134-35)
Arist.Po/.ii79
T h e Universe as C o s m o s
Gr.Naz.Or.29.2
(SC 250:178)
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:57)
Cesaro 1929,7789
Bas.Hex.i.i
(SC 26:86)
Gr.Nyss.Ewn.1.526
(Jaeger 1:178)
Gr.Nyss.Hom.opi/.ftii
(PG 44:125)
Gr.Naz.Or.2.4
(SC 247:90)
Bas.Hex5.10
(SC 26:32022)
Gr.Nyss.Wrg.4
(Jaeger 8-1:276)
9i
92.
Gr.Nyss.Eww. 2.222
(Jaeger 1:290)
Gr.Nyss.EMM.3.4.34
(Jaeger 2:147)
Gr.Nyss.w. 3.2.124
(Jaeger 2:92-93)
Gr.Nyss.fi<n.1.402
(Jaeger 1:143-44)
Gr.Nyss.Hex.
(PG 44:92)
Courtonne 1934,13136
Bas.Hex.z.z
(SC 26:148)
Gr.Nyss. Infant.
(Jaeger 3-11:71)
See pp.74-81
N a t u r a l Theology as Apologetics
comprehensive formula of Gregory of Nyssa for this comprehensive worldview. Such a worldview was equally necessary whether
one looked "at the cosmos as a whole, or at the parts of the
cosmos making up that complete whole." Each of those many
parts of the cosmos was an individual unto itself, incapable of
comparison with the universe as a whole or with the other individual natures within the universe. Empirical observation would
confirm such a "dissimilarity among the elements of the world,"
by which there was "in each thing making up the framework of
the whole, an adherence to its natural opposite." Nevertheless,
each individual creature was beautiful in its own way. But most
beautiful of all was the world order as cosmos, binding "all the
diverse parts of the universe by such links of indissoluble attachment and by so perfect a fellowship and harmony as to make the
most distant, in spite of their distance, appear united in one
universal sympathy." Therefore, someone who started "from a
philosophical perspective" and came to the study of science
would "possess the soul-insight" that made possible "a consideration of the harmony of the whole." Such an observer would
"inspect the beautiful harmony that resulted even from opposite
movements in the circular revolutions" of the heavens, according
to the Ptolemaic solar system, and would note "the inner circles
of these turning in the opposite direction from that of the fixed
stars."
As part of its rejection, on grounds of natural theology, of all
alternatives to monotheism, Cappadocian apologetics on the
doctrine of God repudiated any pantheistic interpretation of this
doctrine that the cosmos was a "complete whole," as though the
cosmos possessed such wholeness because of the metaphysical
identity of the creation with the Creator. The repudiation of pantheism was important also for their cosmology. For a necessary
corollary of the doctrine of God, within natural theology as well
as within revealed theology, was the principle that the concept of
a "complete whole" was not to be permitted to lead to the theory
that the stuff of which the cosmos was made had from eternity
coexisted with God but separately from God. That theory was
opposite to pantheism in the sense that it did not identify God
and the world, and yet in certain ways it was akin to it, because it
attributed to the world an eternity that was to be attributed to
God alone. By applying also to this issue the apophatic method of
affirmation-through-negation, which was worked out above all
in their doctrine of God and their doctrine of the knowledge of
God, the Cappadocians made use of their cosmology as a means
of reaffirming in yet another form their doctrine of divine transcendence. Therefore, Gregory of Nyssa was obliged to assent
when Eunomius's confession of faith declared: "In the act of
creation, God does not stand in need of matter or parts or natural
instruments"; this meant, Gregory agreed, that there was "in the
93
. . ..
.,
ap.Gr.Nyss.H0m.0pv.23
{PG 44:209-12.)
(SC 26:146)
which is without extension?" To resolve the dilemma, this compromise position put forth a theory of "double origin," attributing "the form of the world to the supreme Artificer" and "matter
to a source external to the Creator."
94
G N
onif
(PG 44:112.)
R
(sc26:198)
Dt 6:4
...
Gr.Nyss.Tres an
(Jaeger 3-1:155)
_ ,.
Bas.Hex.z.z
(SC 16:148)
,,
KT
(Jaeger 1:311)
'
worship of Christ as divine. Similarly, all the apologetic arguments in support of apophasis were employed to refute the theory
of the eternity of matter. For while representing themselves as a
means of safeguarding the doctrine of divine transcendence, such
theories constituted an unwarranted effort "to measure a power
both incomprehensible to the human reason and unutterable by
the human voice." This put them into the same class with all the
other presumptuous attempts to encompass the ineffable mystery
of divine being within the limitations of "the human reason" and
'
T h e Universe as C o s m o s
Bas.Hex.z.z
(SC 26:146)
Bas.Spir.z6.6i
(SC 17:466)
Gilson 1944
McKeon 1939,206-31
Jacks 1922,82.-105;
Ghellinck 1930,3538
Dehnhard 1964;
Courcelle 1967,4026;
Pepin 1982,251-60
Merlan i960
Cherniss 1930,1225
2 M c 4 : i ; Heb 11:10
Wis I5:i3;2 Mc 10:2;
4 Mc 7:8
Cornford 1957,3339
95
"Such is the idea that they make for themselves of the divine work
of creation [demiourgia]. The form of the world is due to the
wisdom of the supreme artificer, matter came to the creator from
without, and thus the world results from a double origin." Elsewhere, however, Basil found the distinction between "matter"
and "form" sufficiently attractive to see in it a fitting analogy for
the doctrine of the Holy Spirit. It was the Aristotelian version of
these questions that was to leave its mark permanently on what
the Gifford Lectures of Etienne Gilson called "the spirit of medieval philosophy," for it proved to be eminently useful to medieval
Western scholastic philosophy, specifically also in its interpretation of the universe as cosmos. But as was evident from Basil's
brief summary, Aristotle combined this "hylomorphism" with
the view that creation consisted in bringing preexistent matter
together with form to produce reality, and therefore that matter
itself was not created out of nothing. The regard of Thomas
Aquinas for Aristotle's natural wisdom was sorely tested by a
doctrine that was so overtly contradictory to the Christian doctrine of creatio ex nihilo. Having affirmed that both the existence
of God itself and the concept of creation could be demonstrated
by natural reason without the aid of divine revelation, Thomas
was then obliged to acknowledge that creation out of nothing
could not be demonstrated by reason but only by revelation.
Although the Cappadocians were repeatedly obliged to address this and other challenges from Aristotelian cosmology, it
was clear even on the basis of the language quoted from Basil that
the principal Classical foil for their cosmological thought, as for
their metaphysical thought generally, was not Aristotle but Plato.
Especially was this so if, whatever their reading of the writings of
the Neoplatonists may have been, "Plato" was lumped with the
systems of later Middle Platonic and Neoplatonic thinkers (the
sharp distinction between Plato and Neoplatonism, and then the
interposition of the additional category of "Middle Platonism,"
being largely a phenomenon of modern scholarship). Often they
reached back over Neoplatonism to Plato himself. Although the
term "demiourgos" did appear once in the Septuagint and once
in the New Testament, while the cognate verb "demiourgein"
appeared three times in the Septuagint but not in the New Testament, Basil's use of "demiourgia" for the creation carried unmistakable echoes of the most important Platonic dialogue to deal
with the doctrine of creation, the Timaeus. It is noteworthy
that all the Cappadocians repeatedly turned to this dialogue in
96
Gr.Nyss.wM.i.330
(Jaeger 1:114-2.5)
Adam 1908,373-74
Grote 1865,3:185
Wolfson 1947,2:483-84
Danielou 1944
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:57)
97
(sc 16:148)
Sus 41
Gr.Nyss.H0m.0pif.19
'
(sc 16:148)
.. r
,
you know all secrets and foresee all things [ho eidos ta panta]!"
As the "Maker of heaven and earth," God was "the Creator even
of the essence of beings," not merely "an inventor of figures" but
the Creator of "the ousia with the form [eideis]." Although the
number of individual human souls was countless, therefore, there
Gnins
(PG 36:314)
Gr.Nyss.w.3.5.61
(Jaeger 1:183)
. ,
(Jaeger 3-11:77)
G N
^ ..
...
wa
Cjr.Nyss. Virg. 11
(Jaeger 8-1:191)
(sc 16:104-6)
Bas H
(SC 16:146-48)
Bas.Hex.1.5
(sc 2.6:104-6)
Ba
(sc 16:144-46)
See pp.268-79
condition suitable for the exercise of supernatural powers, outstripping the limits of time, eternal and infinite." It was deceiving
to draw analogies from human crafts, in which tecbne took preexistent "matter [hyle]" and imposed "form [morphe]" upon it.
This Christian adaptation of the various Classical doctrines of
"form" was nevertheless an analogy sufficiently apt to supply
several distinct advantages to the apologetic enterprise. On the
one hand, it provided a structure within which it was possible to
address the always vexing problem of the metaphysical relation of
an intellectual-spiritual Deity to the physical reality of a body. To
resolve that problem, it was necessary to posit a definition of
logos as "an intellectual and not a corporeal method of examination." Color, quantity, and the other properties of a body, which
were necessary "to keep the whole idea of the body from being
dissolved," were themselves "intelligible," that is, perceived by
the intellect; and a "Divinity also intellectual in nature" could be
seen as having endowed these "intellectual potentialities" with
_ .,
.,
Gt.Nyss.Hom.opif.2.4
(PG 44:212-13)
_ ..
' '
'
the material world of the body into being. On the other hand, the
Christianization of the doctrine of ideas made it possible to argue
that although here below tecbnai were subsequent to matter, it
was a "debasement of reasonings" to make such a transfer to the
action of God the Creator; for God created the ideas before the
[SC 26:146-48)
N
(PG 36:324)
1 Cor 13:12
E
(Courtonne 1:36)
..
.,
Gr.Nyss.tlom.op1f.z4
(PG 44:212-13)
n
The Universe as C o s m o s
Gr.Nyss.Eun. 2.4 3 5
(Jaeger 1:353-54)
Gr.Nyss.Eww. 2. 291
(Jaeger i:3iz)
Gr.Nyss.Ewn.1.388
(Jaeger 1:140)
Unterstein 1903,58
Levie 1920,135-44
Joosen 1941,11633
Bas.Ep.38.5
(Courtonne 1:87)
Ptol. Aim. 4. i
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:3233)
Gr.Nyss.Hom.opif.zy
(PG 44:228)
99
ioo
sequence of summer and winter, and of day and night, did seem to
be invoking some version of the familiar cosmological argument
for the existence of God. Expanding on this same theme in
greater detail, Gregory of Nyssa drew a contrast between the
earth as "the place of variation and flux" and "heavenly things,
moving in their own courses in a series of orderly sequence."
Elsewhere he displayed his knowledge of astronomy to good advantage in arguments against heretics; it also stood him in good
stead in explaining the invocations of the "north wind [borras]"
Gr.Naz.Or.6.15
{PG 35:741)
Gr.Nyss.Beat!
(PG 44:1192.)
Gr Nvss Eun z 71
(jaeger 1:247-48)
8^
Gr.Nyss.Catttio
(jaeger 6:294-95)
See pp.152-61
n
(PG 35:761)
(SC 2.6.348)
(Courtonne 1:47)
_ ..
Gr.Nyss.EMH.2.77-78
(jaeger 1:249-50)
(SC 26:386)
mate reality. Yet all such usage of terms like "lower" and
"higher" orders of natural phenomena was fundamentally relativized by the overwhelming ontological difference between the
Creator and all creatures, whether higher or lower. In short, as
Gregory of Nazianzus showed in great scientific detail, the wonders of the natural world already surpassed human understand-
T h e Universe as Cosmos
Gr.Naz.Or.28.2z30
(50250:14470)
Bas.Hex.5.3
(SC 26:290)
Macf.aj>.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.tes. (PG 46:25-28)
Bas.Hex.6.11
(SC 26:384)
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:32)
Ladner 1959,212
22,227-29,454-59
Gr.Naz.Or.41.2
(PG 36:329)
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:33)
Bas.Hex.1.3
(5026:96-98)
Wis 11:20
Gr.Nyss.Hex.
(PG 44:8s)
Bas.Spm18.44
(SC 17:4024)
Gr.Nyss.Cant.6
(Jaeger 6:193)
Keenan 1941,8-30;
Keenan 1944,150-61;
Janini Cuesta 1947,
337-62
Janini Cuesta 1946,
11820
Gr.Nyss.Hex.
(PG 44:104-5)
See p. 299
Gr.Nyss.Or.catech.)j
(Meridier 172-82)
Gr.Nyss. V.Macr.
(Jaeger 8-1:405)
Gr.Nyss. Horn. opif. 30
(PG 44:240)
Janini Cuesta 1946,29
Gr.Nyss. Beat. 4
(PG 44:1232)
Gr.Nyss. Paup. 1
(Van Heck 7)
Goggin 1947,137-44
ap.Gr.Nyss.Or.dom.4
(PG 44:1161)
Lampe 1369
T h e Universe as C o s m o s
has.Hex.7.4
(SC 26:40811);.
Bultmann 1948,1-36
Peliban 1962
Symb.Nic.(3z$)
(Alberigo-Jedin 5)
Gr.Nyss.WM. 1.533
(Jaeger 1:18081)
Dt 4:24; Heb 12:29
Gv.Nyss.Hex.
(PG 44:81)
Zee 6:12
Gr.Nyss.Ctfwf.io
(Jaeger 6:299)
Seepp.155-57
Gr.Naz.Or.28.14
(SC 250:128-30)
Bas.ffex.5.1
(SC 26:280)
Usener 1911,34878
Bas.Hex.6.10
(SC 26:376)
Bas.wM.i.7
(SC 299:188)
1 Jni:5
Gr.Naz. Or. 3 2.15
(SC 318:116)
Gr.Nyss.CtfHt.4
(Jaeger 6:105)
103
to the disposition of the Creator," refused to accept the limitations that creation had imposed on them for their own good.
Significant though the contributions of insights from mathematics and medicine were for the natural theology and apologetics of the Cappadocians, it would seem that the metaphysics of
light was for them, as it had been for other Greek Christian
thinkers before them and especially for Athanasius, the most farreaching contribution of natural science to natural theology, as
well as to revealed theology. Here again, the distinction between
rhetorical illustration and logical proof was not always precise.
Thus Gregory of Nyssa recognized that even the metaphor "light
out of light," which the creed of the Council of Nicaea had applied to the relation between the Father and the Son in the Trinity,
was at one and the same time both useful and limited, and he
warned against any application of it that would ignore the limitations. In the portrayal of God as a fire, he warned elsewhere,
alluding to passages from both the Old and the New Testament, it
was necessary to think of "something other than ordinary fire"
and light. The prophet Zechariah in the Old Testament had
promised that the very name of Christ would be "the East [anatole]," from which the eternal sun would rise. And just as in the
use of astronomy for natural theology it was necessary to warn
against the danger of astrology, so in the application of light as a
metaphor for the divine the corresponding danger was the worship of the sun. Living in the fourth century, the Cappadocians
were especially sensitive to this, because of the revival of such
worship by the emperor Julian, which stood in the tradition of
the cult of "theunconqueredsun [solinvictus]." Even the majesty
of the sun, therefore, pointed not to itself but beyond itself to "the
sophia of the Creator with the techne." At the same time it was
necessary to be reminded that "light" was a key term for God and
for Christ, especially in the Gospel and the Epistles bearing the
name of the apostle John, And John was also the evangelist who,
by divine inspiration, had made the equation, which went well
beyond a simple metaphor: "God is light."
The Cappadocians found that in dealing with the metaphysics
of light in a dogmatic context, it was essential, for the sake of
intellectual integrity as well as of apologetic credibility and theological accuracy, to speak about it in a way that was informed by
the best of what came from "the scientific experts on the physics
of the question [hoi ta toiauta physiologein epistemones]." That
duty to be well informed scientifically applied with equal force to
104
Gn 1:4
Gr.Nyss.Ewtt. 2. 278
(Jaeger 1:308)
Gr.Naz.Or.40.37
(PG 36:412)
Gr.Nyss.EMtt.1.38
(Jaeger 1:140)
Bas.H<?:*.6.i
($026:326)
Gr.Naz.Or.40.5
(PG 36:364)
Kertsch 1978,150-216
Gr.Nyss.7tt/i7Mf.
(Jaeger 3-11:85)
Lampe 126061
Pl.Tftf.201e
PI.T1m.48b
2 Pt 3 : I O ; 3 : I 2
See p. 12
N a t u r a l Theology as Apologetics
T h e Universe as C o s m o s
Bas.Ep.8.2
(Courtonne 1:24);
Gr.Naz.Or.28.14
(SC 250:128)
Gr.Nyss.Hex.
(PG 44:104)
Gr.Nyss.w.2.222
(Jaeger 1:290)
Gr.Nyss.Maced.
(Jaeger 3-1:91)
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:33)
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:108-9)
Gr.Nyss. Or.t/om.4
(PG 44:1161)
See p. 29 9
Gr.Nyss.Or.ctftec/j.37.12
(Meridier 182)
Bas.Hex.5.10
(SC 26:320-22)
See pp.256-59
Jn 1:14
Gr.Nyss.EwM.2.232
(Jaeger 1:293)
Gr.Nyss.Eww. 1.626
(Jaeger 1:206)
Gr.Nyss..2.228
(Jaeger 1:292)
Bas.Hex.4.2
(SC 26:250)
Bas.Hex.2.7
(SC 26:172-74)
Bas.Hex.3.2
(SC 26:19294);
Gr.Nyss.EMM.3.6.17
(Jaeger 2:191-92)
105
io6
Gr N ss Eun i oz
(Jaeger 1:143-44)
Gr.Nyss.H.3.4.34
(jaeger 2147)
Gr.Nyss.EMK.2.430
(Jaeger 1:352)
whole," but also from the whole to the part. For the same reason,
it was the fact of their having all been brought out from nonbeing
to being, through a creation defined as creation out of nothing,
t iat
GN o
h (,
'
8 a v e t o a " c r e a t e d things their affinity with one another
(Meridier 188)
within this single cosmic system. Once again, therefore, Cappadocian natural theology was simultaneously addressed to the
;. >
apologetic task of finding within Classical thought the anticipations of revealed truth and of pointing beyond all this to the
revealed truth itself, in whose formulation at least some Classical
presuppositions of natural theology also found their place. For
this, however, it was necessary to see that God was not only "the
i Creator of the universe" but its "just Judge, rewarding all the
actions of life according to their merit," and therefore to move
_ j,
also from cosmology as such "to the idea of the apocatastasis of
(SC 26:101)
all things."
CHAPTER
Rom 1:20
Bas.Hex.1.6
(SC 2.6:10)
Gr.Nyss.EMM.2.572-74
(Jaeger 1:393-94)
2 Cor 4:18
Gr.Nyss.Gwti4
(Jaeger 6:411)
PI./'/)i75b;ii5d-e
Was.Leg.lib.gent.9
(Wilson 31)
107
io8
Col 1:16
Gr.Nyss.EwK. i. 17071
(Jaeger 1:105-6)
Gr.Nyss.GJWMI
(Jaeger 6:315)
Gr.Naz.Or.31.13
(SC 150:318-10)
Gr.Nyss. V.Mos.z
(Jaeger 7-1:115)
Gr.Nyss.EMM. 3.8.31
(Jaeger 1:151)
Gr.Naz.Or.30.18
(SC 250:16164)
Gr.Nyss.K.i.5i5
(Jaeger 1:377)
Gr.Nyss.EMM. 1.548
(Jaeger 1:184-85)
Bas.Efev.1.3
(SCz6:i48)
Macr.ap. Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:11)
Gr.Nyss. Horn, opif.zj
(PG 44:118)
N a t u r a l Theology as Apologetics
Paul had also distinguished between "things visible" and "invisible," both of which were created in Christ. That Pauline passage,
too, gave Gregory of Nyssa an opportunity to contrast the "empirical" world and the "intelligible" world. Comparing the materialism in which most people lived with "the mentality of the
disciples of the Logos [he dianoia ton matheteuomenon toi
Logoi]," he once again employed a plural to contrast a life groveling in the dust with one that had been elevated "to the yearning
for the transcendent realities [pros ten epithymian ton hyperkeimenon]." And their sister, Macrina, in a polemic against Epicureanism, rejected the idea of "the visible as the limit of existence" and (employing plurals for the invisible realm yet once
more) accused Epicureanism of being "incapable of seeing any of
the intelligible and noncorporeal realities [ton noeton te kai
asomaton]."
This emphasis of all four Cappadocians on "the intelligible
and noncorporeal realities" could sometimes be formulated in
such a way as to appear to be denying reality to anything else, and
therefore also as denying validity to the ordinary perceptions of
reality by which people had to function in everyday life. For at
times they could speak of God as "that which alone 'is,' in the real
sense of 'being,'" even though this was "not knowable," and
could characterize "being in the true sense of the word" as "the
special distinction of the Godhead." When the verb "to be" was
predicated of any reality other than God, therefore, it was being
employed improperly. They resorted to such extreme formulations when they were intent on drawing, usually by means of the
language of apopbasis, the most radical possible distinction between the divine being and all created beings. But when they were
propounding their entire worldview in a balanced and systematized form, they spoke more precisely, and more comprehensively, of God as "the causality of being for all [ton aition tou
einai tois pasin]," that is, for "beings" that therefore could legitimately be characterized as such. Then they were prepared to
attribute being and essence to other realities than God, though
always of course with the proviso that God was "the Creator even
of the essence of beings." For the same reason, as they sometimes
made clear, they did not intend their critique of a philosophy that
"made our senses the only means of our apprehension of things"
to be taken as in any way a repudiation of the legitimacy of "the
facts known to us through experience." It was the unique ability
of the human mind, as having been made in the image of God but
also as having been deposited in a physical body, that it could
Gr.Nyss.Hom.opif. 2
(PG 44:133)
G N
(Jaeger 1:305-6)
Pl.Prt.32.za
N E
(jaeger 1:340)
_
_ ..
: .
109
Eun.ap.Gr.Nyss.tHK.
G N s H ofz
(PG 44:228)
..
..
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
'
Anim.res. [PG 46:25-28) knowledge of that actual world could be acquired. Gregory of
Nyssa devoted an entire chapter of his treatise On the Making of
Man to an examination and defense of sense experience. Through
"the operation of sight," he noted, drawing on Greek theories of
Arist.A.4i8a27-4i9b3
optics, the mind could "apprehend the things external to the
c N H or
body, and draw to itself the images of phenomena, marking in
(PG 44.152-53)
itself the impressions of the things seen." This functioning of the
sense of sight was not invalidated by the recognition that reason
B
(SC 26:384)
could sometimes see more clearly than the eyes themselves could,
so that, as Socrates had argued, the mind could see and hear
"through [dia] the eyes and through the ears," rather than "by
G'TN SS VMos 2
means oi the eyes and ears." Alongside the knowing that was
(Jaeger 7-1:97)
"not in the eyes," nor in the tongue or nostrils or ears or fingers,
.,
was the "knowing given to us by taste, smell, hearing, touch, and
G N
(PG 44:153)
sight." Gregory of Nyssa, in a passage that has been quoted
Seepp.60-61
earlier, invoked the trustworthiness of the experience of the
(Jaeger 1:277)
E
(Jaeger 1:156-57)
G N
N a t u r a l Theology as Apologetics
Apostolopoulos 1986,
277320
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:32)
Gr.Nyss.Wrg.6
(Jaeger 8-1:278)
Gr.Nyss.V.Mos.2
(Jaeger 7-1:84)
Gr.Nyss.Infant.
(Jaeger 3-11:85)
has.Hex.6.1
(SC 26:326)
Gr.Nyss.Hex.
(PG 44:69)
Gr.Nyss.Cant. 15
(Jaeger 6:439)
Rom 1:20
Bas.Hex.1.6
(SC 26:110)
Alexander 1920
Gr.Nyss.EHn.L361
(Jaeger 1:134)
Gr.Nyss.Hom.opi/'.Z3
(PG 44:20912)
Bas.ww.i.7
(SC 299:192);
Gr.Nyss.fim.2.506-7
(Jaeger 1:374)
Bas.Eun.i.j
(SC 299:192)
Florovsky 7:20910
Whitehead 1929,97
Gr.Nyss.Eww. 1.3 70
(Jaeger 1:136)
Gr.Nyss.Hex.
(PG 44:84)
Dorrie et al. 1976,
24360
Bas.Spm6.15
(SC 17:29092)
Gr.Naz.O.28.10
(SC 250:120)
Bas.SpM6.15
(SC 17:290-92)
Phil 2:10
See pp.21213
See pp.32425
ii2.
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
mm.res.( 4 . 9-72)
(Jaeger 8-1:396)
Zecg.IZ
Gr.Nyss.Ca.io
(jaeger .2.99)
what it actually meant to posit was "three possible states [katastaseis] for a rational nature." The term "in heaven" applied to
"the one with a noncorporeal life from the very first, called the
angelic." "On earth" identified the one "in union with the flesh,
called the human." And "in the depths" referred to "the third,
released by death from fleshly entanglements, and found in souls
pure and simple," after death but before the resurrection of the
bocjy j t c o u i(j a s we U b e interpreted as a spatializing of the spiritual that she herself, as she was dying, had her couch turned
toward the East, thus following the Classical pagan practice of
"orientation." Her brother Gregory of Nyssa, who reported this
incident in his biography of her, justified the practice elsewhere,
m n s comm ntar
'
e
y on the Lord's Prayer. "We turn towards the
East," he explained, "not as if God were present only there for
our contemplation, for the one who is everywhere is not particularly apprehended in any part, embracing the entire universe
equally," but because God planted the garden of Eden "in the
East." Such prayer was an acknowledgment of the prophecy that
Christ, as the true sun, "rose from the East." The universal Chris-
DUS.dplf. 2.7.00
(SC 17:484)
See p.zz9
Gr N s Cant
(Jaeger 6:438)
Gr.Nyss.Tres da
M eer 3~ '5
Mt 5:10
.T
_ ,
Gr.Nyss.Or.aom.i
(PG 44:1145)
GrN 19Ref.i
(jaeger 1:393)
Jn 4:1626
Gr.Nyss.ApolI.
(Jaeger 3-1:2.12)
Rotting 1950,42124
Socr.H.e.1.17
(Hussey 1:104-
Gr.Nyss.fp. 2.715
(Jaeger 8 - I I : i 5 - i 8 )
Gr.Nyss.EMM.3.6.32-33
(Jaeger 2:226)
Gr.Nyss. Beat. 3
(PC 44:1225)
Gr.Nyss.Infant.
(Jaeger 3-11:77)
Gr.Naz.Or.20.9
(SC 270:74)
Gr.Nyss. Bun. 1.624
(Jaeger 1:206)
Caiiahan 19586,3639
Dorrie et al. 1976,
128-55
113
N a t u r a l Theology as Apologetics
H4
Ladner
I9^tizy-z^
Otis 1976,32.7
Cushman 1981,23
Pl.T/m.36e39e
See pp.20,9597
See pp.266-70
Bas.S/M'r.6.14
(SC 17:290)
Gr.Nyss.En.3.7.z3
(Jaeger 2:2.23)
Gr.Nyss.EHH.1.365
er 1:134-35)
Bas.Hex.1.5
(SC 26:104-6)
Gr.Nyss.Cant.13
(Jaeger 6:381)
differences between the way they understood reality and the way
Hellenism did, or at any rate the way they thought Hellenism did.
Regarding their articulation of these issues, Brooks Otis has even
proposed the thesis: "The Christian doctrine of creation is virtually identical with the Christian doctrine of time and both
doctrines were first made intelligible by Gregory of Nyssa." By
contrast with these Christian Platonists, as Robert Cushman has
suggested, "Plato's treatment of time is meager and, apart from
three pages of the Timaeus . . . entirely casual." But it was, as has
been noted at several earlier junctures, with the Timaeus that the
Cappadocians were occupied, more than with any other of the
Platonic dialogues.
Because of the centrality of the doctrine of the incarnation of
the Logos in time and history, much of that reflection pertained
specifically to their exegetical, liturgical, and dogmatic systems
rather than to their natural theology, and thus to their doctrine of
the divine economy. Nevertheless, their thought about time, like
all the other themes of Cappadocian speculation being discussed
here, was simultaneously apologetics and presupposition, belonging to their exposition of natural theology, as well as to their
interpretation of revealed theology. A confusion of the ontological distinction between time and eternity was, Basil insisted, not
only "a breach of true religion" in relation to revealed theology
but also "really the extremest of folly" in relation to natural
theology. Such a confusion, according to Gregory of Nyssa, led to
the literal interpretation of such terms as "before" and "after" in
speaking about "a Lord 'before' times and 'before' aeons," to
whom therefore "terms expressing temporal interval" were not
to be applied properly and literally, because they were "devoid of
all meaning"; this was, or should have been, evident not only
to orthodox believers, but to "anyone endowed with reason."
Therefore, as he said in the same treatise: "It is clear, even with a
moderate insight into the nature of things, that there is nothing by
which we can measure the divine and blessed life. It is not in time,
but time flows from it." The "supernatural powers" of God,
being "eternal and infinite," transcended and outstripped "the
limits of time." Conversely, it was not only those who were
obliged to operate within the limits of reason alone who had to
accept these limits of time; but orthodox believers as well, with all
of their access to divine revelation, had to recognize that eternal
reality, in its transcendence, remained incomprehensible even after it had made itself known in Christ.
Gr.Naz.Or.15.17
(SC 284:198)
Gr.Nyss.EKM.1.361
(Jaeger 1:134)
Gr.Nyss..i.365-69
Gaeger 1:135-36)
Gr.Nyss.Eww. 1.666
(Jaeger 1:217)
Gr.Nyss.EMM. 1.676
(Jaeger 1:220)
Gr.Naz.Of.38.8
(PG 36:320)
Gr.Naz.Or.45.4
(PG 36:628)
Gr.Nyss.EMM. 1.5 74
(Jaeger 1:192)
Gr.Nyss.Or.dom.i
(PG 44:1124-25)
Gr.Naz.Or.38.7
(PG 36:317)
"5
n6
Gr.Naz.Or.45.3
(PG 36:615-28)
Bas.Spir.6.14
(SC 17:290)
Is 44:6
Gr.Nyss.M. 3.3.10
(Jaeger z : n o )
Ps2.:7
Gr.Nyss.Apoll.
(Jaeger 3-1:22.5)
Gn 1:5-31
Gr.Nyss.EHn.r.341
(Jaeger 1:128)
Sas.Hex.1.8
(SC 26:178-80)
Hebi:3
Gr.Nyss.Ew. 1.63 7
(Jaeger 1:209)
Gr.Naz.Or.29.3
{SC 250:182)
Ps 145:13
Gr.Nyss. Maced.
(Jaeger 3-1:103)
Gr.Nyss. Eun. 1.364
(Jaeger 1:134)
Gr.Nyss. Eun. 1.3 41
(Jaeger 1:128)
Gr.Nyss. Maced.
(Jaeger 3-1:103)
Natural T h e o l o g y as Apologetics
changeable nature, but God is eternal being," without a beginning in the past or an end in the futureindeed, without any past
or any future as such. Both in natural theology and in revealed
theology, God was spoken of as arche, but even such a term was
intended to mark the boundaries beyond which human thought
could not go, rather than to give precise information about an
existence that transcended time. God was also spoken of as "the
first [ho protos]" and as "hereafter [meta tauta]," but that was
only a way of declaring "by this means the doctrine of a single
divine nature, continuous with itself, and without interruption,
not admitting in itself priority and posterity." When such a term
of temporal designation as "this day [semeron]" was used in
connection with God, also in the language of Scripture, that
referred to an eternal now, in which there was neither today nor
yesterday nor tomorrow. Or when the creation narrative presented its cosmogony as having taken place over a series of six
"days," that was to be interpreted in the light of the axiomatic
apophatic principle that such a sequence was not to be attributed
to "the prime nature, transcending all idea of time and surpassing
all reach of thought." The "day" and the "week" of the Genesis
narrative were to be understood in the context of the relation of
time to eternity. Applying ontological language to the divine and
speaking of the divine as "being [on]" anything did not imply
encompassing it within time; on the contrary, it meant attributing to it "continuity and eternity and superiority to all marks of
time." Gregory of Nazianzus frankly admitted the problem:
"Such expressions as 'when' and 'before' and 'after' and 'from
the beginning' are not timeless, however much we may force
themunless indeed we were to take the aeon, that interval
which is coextensive with the eternal things, and is not divided or
measured by any motion, or by the revolution of the sun, as time
is measured." But even with regard to this term Gregory of Nyssa
pointed out, though probably not explicitly in response to
Gregory of Nazianzus but to Eunomius or to the Macedonian
heretics, that when the psalm described the kingdom of God as "a
kingdom of all the aeons," the word aeons, too, referred to "every
substance in them created in infinite space, whether visible or
invisible." Thus it was vain to "inquire with curiosity into the
'priority' of the aeons."
By introducing into the discussion of eternity and time such
questions as the "days" of the creation narrative in Genesis, or
such phrases of their own as "created in infinite space," the Cappadocians were likewise making a point of relating the concept of
Space, T i m e , a n d Deity
See pp.92-97
Gr.Nyss.Hom.op//.23
(PG 44:212}
Gr.Nyss.EMM. 1.625
(Jaeger 1:206)
Callahan 19583,437
Aug. Conf. 11.1
(CCSL 27:194)
Gr.Naz.Or.29.9
(SC 250:194)
Gr.Nyss.EwM. 1.3 81
(Jaeger 1:138)
Gr.Nyss.Eww. 1.341
(Jaeger 1:128)
Gr.Nyss.Or.tfom.i
(PG 44:1124-25)
Gr.Nyss.Eww. 1.625
(Jaeger 1:206)
Gr.Nyss.//#.
(Jaeger 3-11:77)
Bas.Sp/V.16.38
(SC 17:376)
Gn 1:5
Bas.Hex.2.8
(SC 26:180)
117
time to the concept of creation. As they formulated it, this position was also aimed at several opposing views. In part it was the
polemic against the Classical theory of the eternity of matter that
occasioned their reflection on the principle that not only matter,
but time itself, was a creation of the one eternal God. But this
emphasis also came from the polemic against the various forms of
the heresy according to which the Son was inferior to the Father
in the Godhead because he had come "after" the Father, as
though "these ideas of time" could "enter into the eternal
world." In language that seemed, in conjunction with that
of the other Cappadocians, to anticipate Augustine's opening
words in Book XI of the Confessions, Gregory of Nazianzus was
prompted, in reply to heretical speculations about the relation of
the Son of God to time, to ask: "Is time in time, or is it not in time?
If it is contained in time, then in what time, and what is it except
that time, and how does it contain it? But if it is not contained in
time, what is that surpassing wisdom that can conceive of a time
that is timeless?" Therefore, "the generation of the only-begotten
one," as Nyssen responded to the heresy with which Nazianzen
was also dealing, did "not fall within the aeons, any more than
the creation was before the aeons." For it was "only in the case of
a creation known empirically" that it was true "to speak about
'priority [to presbyteron],'" but not in the divine nature. It was
true to say about those who were born into this world, with its
threefold division into past, present, and future, that there had
been a time when they were not, that they existed now, and that
there would be a time when they would cease to exist. There was
no room, however, for "these ideas of time in the eternal 'begetting,' " and they had "nothing akin to that world"; for that world
it was necessary to "get beyond the 'sometime,' the 'before,' and
the 'after,' and every mark whatever of this extension in time."
Therefore, that "single, uncreated, eternal essence," which was
God, while transcending time, was also the Creator of "time and
space, with all their consequences."
For although Basil had to admit that there was in the Book of
Genesis no explicit account of this creation of timejust as there
was, he acknowledged, no explicit account there of the creation of
the angelshe interpreted the reference in the Septuagint translation of Genesis to "one day [hemera mia]" rather than to "first
day [hemera prote]" as a way of expressing "a wish to determine
the measure of day and night" and thus of indicating that "God,
who made the measure of time, measured it out and determined it
by intervals of days." The definition of time proposed by Eu-
118
Gn 1:16
Bas.Eww.i.21
(SC 299:246)
Jb 26:7
Gr.Nyss.fim. 2.277
(Jaeger 1:307)
Gr.Nyss.n. 3-7.30
(Jaeger 2:225)
Gr.Nyss.Eww.Lr75
(Jaeger 1:78)
Dorrie et al. 1976,
243-60
Gr.Nyss.EwM.2.460
(Jaeger 1:361)
Gr.Nyss.Ewn. 1.370
(Jaeger 1:136)
Bas.Ep.156.1
(Courtonne 2:82)
Gr.Nyss.fom.2.183
(Jaeger 1:277)
Gr.Nyss.Or.catecA.21.3
(Meridier 102)
N a t u r a l Theology as Apologetics
See pp.2.63-79
Zemp 1970,73-79
G N
VM
119
(Jaeger 7-1:91-92)
being.
Yet just as the incarnation of the Logos was not the only place
where the materiality of the world was part of the divine order, so
also that event, which, like the creation itself, took place "once
XT
Gr.Nyss.Apo//.
'
(jaeger 3-1:2.14)
GN H
(PG 44:2.12)
o'fii
Gn 1:1
.,
..
.,
Gr.Nyss.H0m.0plf.z3
(PG 44:209)
Gn 1:1
'
'
(sc 26:98-100)
'
>
and for all [hapax]," was not the only instance where time
showed itself to be part of the divine order, hence also not the
only instance of the divine economy. The materiality and temporality of the incarnation presupposed the intrinsic goodness of
matter and of time as divine creations, capable of receiving the
divine Logos. It was also on the presupposition of the divine
creation of time that eschatology was based. Gregory of Nyssa
summarized the connection between the doctrine of the beginning and the doctrine of the end as follows: "But if someone,
beholding the present course of the cosmos, by which intervals of
time are marked, going on in a certain order, should say that it is
not possible that the predicted stoppage of these moving things
should take place, such a person clearly also does not believe that
'in the arche' the heaven and the earth were made by God. For
anyone who admits an arche of motion surely does not doubt as
to its also having a telos; and anyone who does not allow its telos
n
'
does not admit its arche either." For "the dogmas of the end, and
of the renewing of the world," according to Basil, had been "announced beforehand in these short words put at the head of the
inspired history: 'In the arche God made.'" What had begun in
time would also come to an end in time. If there was a beginning,
there was no reason to doubt of the end. Both of these applications of the Cappadocian philosophy of time, with their combination of Classical and Christian sources, were decisive for many
other aspects of their system of thought, whether natural or revealed.
CHAPTER
Muckle 1945,55-84
Harl 1971,111-26
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:44-45)
Mure 1964,12.4-25
Mure 1964,163-71
Arist.EN.H77ai5
T h e Image of God
Bas.Hex.9.6
(SC 26:520)
Schoemann 1943,
31-53,175-200; Ladner
I
9S*>59-94; Ladner
1959,90107; Boer
1968,148-86
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:5760)
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:28)
Gr.Naz.Or.38.n
(PG 36:321-24)
Janini Cuesta 1946,5152; Leys 1951,65-67
Lampe 870
QttNyss.Hom.opif. 16
(PG 4 4 : I 7 7 - 8 o )
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:44)
Pl.Prt.343b
N a t u r a l Theology as Apologetics
Gr.Nyss.Hom.opif.z
(PG 44:133)
Eun.ap.Socr.H.e.4.7
(Hussey 2:482)
Gr.Nyss.Eww.2.10714
(Jaeger 258-59)
Ps 138:14
Bas. Hex. 9.6
(SC 26:51214)
Gr.Nyss. Infant.
(Jaeger 3-11:76)
Pl./Vf^iac
Lv 26:13; Pl.Swp.190a
Gr.Nyss. Horn, opif.8
{PG 44:144)
Gn 2:7
Gr.Nyss. Infant.
(Jaeger 3-11:77)
of self and the knowledge of the world, placing their characteristic emphasis on the "ineffable [arreton]" mystery of the divine
being. To those who claimed that the human mind could understand the divine essence as God understood it, they replied with
the argument a minori ad maius that even the understanding of
one's own essence was unattainable. Self-knowledge was the
most difficult of all the sciences, Basil argued. Yet it was also, if
carried out responsibly, no less a "light of theology" and no less
reliable a guide to the natural knowledge of God than was the
knowledge of the world; "in observing myself," he could pray,
commenting on the words of the psalm about how "fearfully
[phoberos]" man had been fashioned, "I have known thy infinite
wisdom." And like the knowledge of God through the knowledge of the worldabout which the New Testament, quoting the
Old Testament, had asked, "Who knows the mind of the
Lord?"the knowledge of one's own mind had to be interpreted
apophatically.
In the investigation of anthropology, as well as of cosmology
as a whole, the determination of answers to the questions
"Whence [hothen]?" and "Wherefore [hotou]?" was fundamental to all other questions. Drawing less on Christian than on
Greek sources, Nyssen made the observation that although other
animals had a natural covering, such as fur or a shell, or natural
weapons, such as claws or fangs, the human animal was bereft of
any of these. From the same mixture of Christian and Classical
sources came the identification of the erectness of the human
form, "upright and extending aloft toward heaven," as evidence
of a special status and dignity in comparison with that of other
creatures. Thus, not only in treatises that were apologetic in intent but in those that were being written for edification or dogmatic clarification and that were addressed to church audiences,
they were able to invoke the Classical sources of natural theology
alongside the Christian sources of revealed theology. They felt
justified in arguing this way because, on the one hand, they could
take it for granted that all things had been produced by the divine
essence; this was "a proposition superfluous to prove," inasmuch
as it was undeniable to "anyone, with however little insight into
the truth of things," and therefore it was a truth of natural theology on which everyone would have to agree. But on the other
hand, they felt free to add, "We are helped in this by a word of the
inspired teaching," which declared that the creation of humanity
"from heterogeneous sources" had taken place subsequently to
the creation of all the other things. Unlike animal life, moreover,
Gt.Nyss.Hom.opif.}
(PG 44:136)
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. {PG 46:60)
Gr.Nyss. Cant.z
(Jaeger 6:68)
Merki 1952,138-64
Lit.Bas.
(Brightman 32.4)
Gr.Nyss. Hom.opif. 16
(PG 44:180)
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. [PG 46:121)
Gr.Nyss. Horn. opif. 16
(PG 44:180)
Gr.Naz.p.io2
(PG 37:197)
Gr.Nyss. Beat, i
(PG 44:1200)
Gr.Naz.Or.14.2
(PG 35:860)
Gr.Naz.Or.17.9
(PG 35:976)
123
124
Gr.Naz.Or.14.14
(PG 35:876)
Gr.Nyss. Or.dom.z
(PG 44:1144)
See pp.14849
Seepp.58-59
Lk 17:21
Gr.Nyss.B<Mf.6
(PG 44:12.69)
Gr.Nyss. Cant.4
(Jaeger 6:104)
Gr.Nyss.Caf.n
(Jaeger 6:333-34)
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:44)
Gr.Nyss.CflMf.14
(Jaeger 6:404)
Gr.Nyss. V.Macr.
(Jaeger 8-1:382)
Gr.Nyss. Cant.9
(Jaeger 6:276-77)
Has.Leg.lib.gent.9
(Wilson 32)
Pl.R.498b;533d
Rom.13:14; Gal.5:13
Rebecchi 1943,32225
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:124-25)
N a t u r a l Theology as Apologetics
T h e Image of G o d
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:29)
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:40)
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. [PG 46:57)
Brunner 1939,92-93
Bernard 1952
Gn 1:2627; Gn 5:1;
Gn 9:6; Wis 2:23;
Sir 17:3; 1 Cor 11:7; Jas
3:9
Leys 1951,123-27
PSI:I
Mt 5:3
Gi.Nyss.Beat.i
(PG 44:1197)
125
126
Gr.Nyss. Hom.opif.i8
(PG 44:192)
Gr.Naz.Of.31.2z
(SC 250:316-18)
Gr.Nyss. Beat.i
(PG 44:1216)
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:52)
See pp.40-5 6
N a t u r a l Theology as Apologetics
The Image of G o d
127
Gr.Nyss.Eww. 1.527
(Jaeger 1:178-79)
Bas.Hejc.4.5
(SC 26:264-66)
Gr.Nyss.E.3.2.4
(Jaeger 2:53)
Gr.Nyss..z.2ii12
(Jaeger 1:28687)
Gr.Nyss.Hom.opif.6
(PG 44:137-40)
Gr.Nyss.fZMM.2.107-14
(Jaeger 1:258-59)
Gr.Nyss.B<?<i/.6
{PG 44:1269-72)
Schoemann 1941,33940; Balas 1966
Gr.Nyss.H0m.0pif.16
(PG 44:184)
Gr.Nyss.EMK.1.191
(Jaeger 1:82)
Heb 2:5Ps8:6
12.8
Bas..233.1
(Courtonne 3:39)
Gr.Nyss. V.Macr.
(Jaeger 8-1:380)
Macr.ap. Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:57)
Gr.Nyss.Or.rfom.3
(PG 44:1149)
Gr.Naz.Or.45.18
(PG 36:648)
Gr.Naz.Or.32.9
(SC 318:194)
Gr.Nyss.Apoll.
(Jaeger 3-1:177)
Gr.Nyss.EMM. 2.190
(Jaeger 1:279)
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:52)
Lk 15:810
Gr.Nyss. Virg. 12
(Jaeger 8-1:300-301)
Gr.Nyss. V.Mos. 2.
(Jaeger 7-1:62)
Pl.PMr.246-47;
PU.439d
Gn 2:7
Gr.Nyss. Or.catech. 6.4
(Meridier 36)
N a t u r a l T h e o l o g y as Apologetics
T h e Image of G o d
..
.,
129
ligence and reason should have hegemony over the senses and
emotions. For the emotions were shared by human nature with
the irrational creatures; but precisely because of the combination
of these with reason in the case of human sin it was characteristic
of "all those particular forms proceeding from the absence of
reason in brute nature to become vice by the evil use of the mind,"
whereas in the irrational beasts they were not vice. On the other
hand, "with the dominance of reason over such emotions," each
was transmuted to a form of arete: wrath became courage, terror
turned into caution, fear expressed itself as obedience, hatred was
transformed into aversion from vice, and the power of love was
made sublime in the desire for the truly beautifulall of these
Gr.Nyss. Hom.0ptf.1S
(PG 44:193-96)
Col 3.1
.,
'
Gr.Nyss..3.1.31
(Jaeger 1:14)
Mt 5:4
N _
(PG 44:1x16)
(sc 16:384)
Gr.Nyss.M.i.i86
(Jaeger 1:2.78)
4
G' '
c
(Jaeger 6:438)
.. . ,
Gr.Nyss. Infant.
(Jaeger 3-11:73)
G N
Apostolopoulos 1986.
(Jaeger 6:169)
2.51-71
130
Lampe 31718
Gr.Naz.Or.38.12
(PG 36:324)
Gr.Nyss.Be<rf. 5
(PG 44:1153-56)
Gr.Naz.Or.14.25
(PG 35:892)
Gr.Nyss.Or.catecfc.5.;
10 (Meridier 30)
Jn 10:18
Gr.Nyss.R6'/".i39
(Jaeger 2:372)
Lit.Bas.
(Brightman 327)
1 Tm 2:4
Gr.Nyss.Gmtio
(Jaeger 6:304)
Gr.Nyss. Mace d.
(Jaeger 3-1:114)
Clark 1977,4566
Gr.Nyss.Apo//.
(Jaeger 3-1:198)
Preger 1897,3652
Gr.Nyss. Or.dom. 2
(PG 44:1145)
Gr.Nyss. Horn. opif. 16
(PG 44:184)
N a t u r a l Theology as Apologetics
T h e Image of G o d
Jaeger 6:iozn
Gr.Nyss.CtfMr.4
(Jaeger 6:102)
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:
110-2.1)
Gr.Nyss. V.Mos.z
(Jaeger 7-1:56)
ap.PlTbt.160d
Gr.Nyss.Cant.9
(Jaeger 6:264-65)
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:41-44)
Gr.Nyss. Cant.12.
(Jaeger 6:343)
Gr.Nyss. Virg. 12
(Jaeger 8-1:297-98)
G n 1:2627
I31
of Christian philosophy" (and not merely of Christian dogmatics), Gregory of Nyssa described a "human nature capable in
accordance with knowledge [dektike kata gnomen] to take the
direction indicated by the inclination of its free choice [he rope tes
proaireseos]." That direction could be either for good or for ill;
for, as Macrina pointed out, the soul could "be attracted of its
own free will [tei idiai gnomei] in a chosen direction, either willfully shutting its eyes to the good . . . or, conversely, preserving
undimmed its vision of the truth." Or, in her brother's formula,
"We human beings have here within ourselves [oikothen], in our
own nature and free choice, the causes both of light and of darkness." In their apologetics, the Cappadocian theologians showed
that they were Greeks as well as Christians by appropriating such
philosophical themes as the familiar doctrine of Protagoras
quoted by Plato, "Man is the measure of all things [panton
chrematon anthropon metron einai]," and adapting them to the
defense of free will. At the same time, this defense served as an
apologetic weapon against the determinism, both astrological
and philosophical, that they perceived to be endemic to the speculations of pagan Classicism.
Just as rationality and free will were inseparable in the doctrine of the image of God, so in turn free will and immortality
belonged together as components of the image. For the only path
that led to eternal life was a discipline that was not coerced but
voluntary. Being at one and the same time "the work and the
imitation [mimema] of the divine and imperishable mind," mankind [anthropos], this "reasoning and intelligent creature," was
created immortal. After having listed "life, reason, wisdom, and
all the good things of God" that were included in the divine
image, Gregory of Nyssa turned to immortality as essential to the
image: "Since eternity [aidiotes] is also one of the good attributes
of the divine nature, it is essential that the constitution of our own
nature should not be deprived of this. It had to have an immortal
[athanaton] element, so that it might, by this inherent faculty,
recognize the transcendent and have the desire for the immortality of God. The account of creation sums all this up in a single
expression when it says that mankind was created 'in the image of
God.'" He described the image of God evident in Moses "the
mystagogue" as "incorruption [aphtharsia]," and he interpreted
the allegory of the "vineyard" in the Song of Songs as an exposition of "immortality and apatheia and likeness to God." He also
argued that there could not be degrees of immortality: it was not
132.
Gr.Nyss.EH.1.590
(Jaeger 1:398)
Gr.Naz.Or.19.13
(SC 150:101)
Gr.Nyss. V.Macr.
(Jaeger 8-1:390)
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:17)
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. {PG 46:44-45)
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:48)
Armstrong 1948,113-16
1 Thes 4:13
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:11-13)
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:49)
Mt 13:1430
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:64)
1 Cor 15:41
N a t u r a l Theology as Apologetics
T h e Image of G o d
Gr.Nyss. Anim.res.
(PG 46:64)
Gr.~Nyss.Anim.res.
(PG 46:17)
Apostolopoulos 1986
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:29)
Quasten 3:261
Gr.Nyss. Anim.res.
(PG 46:17)
Acts 17:18
See p. 15 2
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:21)
Arist.AK.413b
133
134
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:52.)
Pl.PMr.246-47
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:4952)
Gr.Nyss.Am'm.res.
(PG 46:11-12)
Danielou 1953,15470
PI.R.6i 4 b;6i5c
Gr.Nyss. Infant.
(Jaeger 3-11:70)
VIMen.iib-c
Gr.Nyss.Anim.res.
(PG 46:109)
Bas.ffet.8.2
(SC 26:436)
Gr.Naz.Or.29.13
(SC 250:202)
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:49)
has.Leg.lib.gent.10
(Wilson 35)
Gr.Nyss. Hom.opif. 16
(PG 44:180-81)
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:41)
N a t u r a l Theology as Apologetics
Gr.Naz.0.34-ii
(SC 318:218)
Jaki 1978,47
See pp.2.80-95
z P t 1:4
Gr.Nyss.Betf.3
(PG 44:1125-28)
135
CHAPTER
Gr.Nyss.V.Mos.z
(Jaeger 7-1:43)
Gr N ss Pauo 2.
(Van Heck 29)
(sc 509.186)
Bas.Hex.7.5
(SC 26:414-16)
Of all the titles that the Cappadocians themselves used for what
we have been calling here their "natural theology," the nearest
approximation to that concept may well be the term employed by
Gregory of Nyssa when he spoke of "moral and natural philosophy [he ethike te kai physike philosophia]"; he identified this as
the product of natural reason, which was to be "joined to the
more sublime life [toi hypseloteroi bioi syzygos]" of supernatural
revelation. Therefore he could speak, also in an address to Christians, about "not sinning against natural law [meden eis ton tes
physeos nomon examartanein]." Analyzing such moral and natural philosophy, Gregory of Nazianzus pointed out that "reason" (natural theology) and "theology" (revealed theology) were
in agreement when it came to such a virtue as the biblical imperative, "Honor your father and your mother," though he added
that the treatment of parents by their children in Classical myr
thology contradicted it. Arguing in a similar vein about "a natural rationality [physikos logos] implanted in us, telling us to
identify ourselves with the good and to avoid all harmful things,"
Basil of Caesarea drew an embarrassing contrast between an irrational creature, such as a fish, which knew what to seek and what
to avoid, and human beings, "honored with reason, instructed by
law," and endowed with other benefits, who nevertheless behaved less reasonably in their own lives than the fish did. And at
her death his sister, Macrina, Christian saint that she was, was
celebrated also for having trained her fellow ascetics not only in
136
Gr.Nyss. V.Macr.
(Jaeger 8-1:401)
Arist.EN.1128a.25
Florovsky 7:83
Cesaro 1929,10922
Reiche 1897,42
Phil 4:8
Gr.Nyss. Cant.15
(Jaeger 6:438)
Gr.Nyss. Virg. 11
(Jaeger 8-1:297)
Skeat 1858,244
Gr.Naz.Or.30.18
(SC 250:26264);
Gr.Nyss.Tres dii
(Jaeger 3-1:44)
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:92)
Gr.Nyss. V.Mos. 1
(Jaeger 7-1:3)
137
following the specifically Christian way of life but in "maintaining good order and decency [tetagmenon kai euschemon]," concepts and terms familiar to students of Classical ethics at least
since Aristotle. Thus, all four Cappadocians strove to articulate a
"moral and natural philosophy."
It was in keeping with this emphasis on the "moral and natural" that Gregory of Nyssa also felt able to urgein opposition
to a position that it would have been "the extremest form of
irrationality [alogia]" to accept and in support of a position that
was confessed "even by our foes"that "the divine and unalterable nature" of God was "absolutely unlimited in its goodness."
Sometimes he spoke of God as "the most beautiful and supreme
good of all, to which all things with a tendency towards the
kalon" inclined. Elsewhere, too, he referred to "the desire for the
kalon kai agatbon." Florovsky has observed that "as a Hellenist
Gregory [of Nyssa] connects love with beauty and goodness,"
and that Basil could speak "of the world's harmonious diversity
with the enthusiastic appreciation of an aesthete"; Cesaro has
spoken of Basil's aesthetic "romanticism about nature"; and
Reiche has commented on "the unbroken unity between the
beautiful and the good" in Nyssen's thought. Gregory also
quoted from the New Testament the biblical version of the identification of the beautiful and the good with everything "honest,
pure, and lovely." Therefore, it was a first principle of his natural
theology, which he was sure was "intelligible, without even being
said, to anyone not mentally blind," to identify "the God of the
universe" as "the only absolute, and primal, and unrivalled kalon
kai agatbon and purity."
Speakers and writers of German, English, and other Germanic
languages have long been fond of the etymological explanation of
the name "God" on the basis of the adjective "good," but it
seems clear from Indo-Germanic linguistics that this derivation
was mistaken and that, as Skeat's Etymological Dictionary of the
English Language has put it, the name God was "in no way allied
to good." Even without such an etymology, however, the Cappadocians, who did not agree among themselves about the etymological derivation of the word "God," identified God as "a
nature surpassing every possible idea of the good," a nature
"lacking in nothing good," and therefore "in itself the plenitude
of every good [ton agathon to pleroma]." In one sense it could be
said that every good, even a created good, was "by its very nature
unlimited." But that principle applied in a unique way to this,
138
Gr.Nyss.Wrg.io
(Jaeger 8-1:289)
Gr.Nyss. Beat. 3
(PG 44:1225)
G N
(Jaeger 2:221-22)
ee pp.57-5
(PG 44:1269-72)
y.
(Jaeger 8-1:290-91)
G N
..
...
"the first good, visible beyond any other good [to proton agathon
kai to epekeina pantos agathou theoreitai]." Therefore, the affirmation that "everything sublime in thought and word" was concerned with God and that "every noble thought and word" was
related to God had to be prefaced by the apophatic qualifier:
1 "What human thought can search out the nature of what we
seek? What names or expressions can we invent to produce in us a
worthy conception of the light beyond?" And the apparently
affirmative statement, "The divine nature is at all times filled with
all good, or rather is itself the fullness of all good," really meant
that no good was adventitious to the divine nature, that it needed
no addition for its perfecting, and that such negative language
had to be proliferated in order to do justice to the divine nature.
g u t j u s t a s apQpbatic theology in general, instead of disqualifying the speculative enterprise, became a justification for it, so
this application of it to the question of the transcendently good
and beautiful led to affirmative conclusions about immanent
goodness and beauty. Apophatic language was the only way to
speak about an "invisible and formless beauty, devoid of qualities
and far removed from everything recognizable in bodies by the
eye," a beauty that transcended every "beauty perceived by the
senses [aistheton kallos]" but that at the same time heightened
the human appreciation of such beauty "through our power of
aesthetic feeling." Ultimately, however, there would have to come
that celebration of divine beauty about which Gregory of Nyssa
wrote: "Admiration even of the beauty of the heavens, and of the
dazzling sunbeams, and indeed of any fair phenomenon, will
then cease. The beauty noticed there will be but as the hand to
lead us to the love of that supernal beauty whose glory the
heavens and the firmament declare and whose secret the whole
Gr.Nyss.V<rg.ii
(Jaeger 8-1:293-94)
N
(PG 44:1293)
N _
(PG 44:1225)
T h e Source of All G o o d
(PG 44:184)
Gr.Nyss.ft'd.
(Jaeger 3-1:66)
Gr.Nyss.Re/.7-8
(jaeger 2:315)
GrN s M d
(Jaeger 3-1:109)
Zee 9.17
_
n ..
Gr.Nyss.iiMM.2.377-78
(Jaeger 1:336)
Gr N ss Beat
(FG 44:1249)
.,
(50318:312)
Gr N s Beat 6
(PG 44^269-72)
139
'
"
'
N a t u r a l T h e o r y as Apologetics
140
Gr.Nyss.Vz'rg.ii
(Jaeger 8-1:292)
Gt.Nyss.Beat.S
(PG 44:1296)
Bas.Hex.1.1
(SC 26:88)
Bas.Ep.236.4
(Courtonne 3:52)
Keenan 1944,16061
Gr.Nyss.Cr.2
(Jaeger 6:56)
Gr.Nyss.CflMf.4
(Jaeger 6:106)
Gr.Nyss.Or.ctffecfe.7.4
(Meridier 48)
Gr.NyssJtt/imr.
(Jaeger 3-11:94)
Gr.Nyss.Ewtt.2.422
(Jaeger 1:349-50)
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:93)
See pp.7981
Bas.Hex.2.5
(SC 26:162)
T h e Source of All G o o d
Scholl 1881,97-100
Bas.Het.5.7
(SC 16:312)
Winslow 1979,147
Gr.Nyss.V.Mos.z
(Jaeger 7-1:76)
Biittner 1913,1419
See p.197
DTC 15:2739-99
1 Cor 13:13
Arist.N.i42ob2o21
Arist.N.ii33b33113436
Arist.fiN.i I74b2425;no7b46
Arist.N.in6aio-ii
iil 4 :8
Gr.Nyss.CflMf.15
(Jaeger 6:438-42)
Bas.Hex.9.4
(SC 26:496-98)
141
I42.
Gr.Nyss.V.Mos.2
(Jaeger 7-1:57)
Arist.EN. 1128325
Gr.Nyss.V.Macr.
(Jaeger 8-1:401)
Eph 6:4
Bas.Hex.9.4
(SC 26:498)
Gr.Naz.Or.4.121
(SC 309:286)
Pl.R.36ia
Bas.Leg.lib.gent.6
(Wilson 26)
Gr.Naz.Or.4.44
(SC 309:144)
Arist.EN.i 10432526
Gr.Nyss.CaKt.9
(Jaeger 6:284)
Gr.Naz.Or.43.60
(PG 36:573)
Gr.Nyss.Wrg.7
(Jaeger 8-1:282)
Gt.Nyss.Or.catech .2.0.6
(Meridier 100)
Gr.Nyss. Beat. 4
(PG 44:1233)
Pl.R.357-83;
Arist.N.ii33b33
H34a6
N a t u r a l T h e o r y as Apologetics
T h e Source of All G o o d
Gr.Nyss.Beat.5
(PG 44:1252)
Gr.Nyss. Virg.pr.
(Jaeger 8-1:147)
Gr.Nyss. Virg. 7
(Jaeger 8-1:282)
Cr.Nyss.Apoll.
(Jaeger 3-1:164)
Wis 4:i;5:i3;8:7
Phil 4 : 8 ; i P t 2:9;
2 P t 1:352 Pt 1:5
See pp.129,137,141
Gr.Nyss. Beat.4
(PG 44:1244)
Gr.Nyss. Virg.9
(Jaeger 8-1:286)
Gr.Nyss. Cant.<>
(Jaeger 6:271)
143
144
Gr.Nyss.Gmt. 14
(Jaeger 6:418)
Gr.Naz.Or.30.19
(SC 250:2.64-66)
Gr.Nyss.Tres dii
(Jaeger 3-1:331-36)
See pp.12735
Bas.Hex.7,5
(SC 26:414-16)
Gr.Nyss. V.Mos. 2
(Jaeger 7-1:43)
Gr.Nyss.Apoll.
(Jaeger 3-1:198)
Bas.Hex.6.7
(SC 26:362)
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:117-20)
Gr.Nyss. Or.dom. 3
(PG 44:1156)
Clark 1977,45-66;
Arist.EN.i 109(531
Gr.Nyss. Cant. 5
(Jaeger 6:160-61)
N a t u r a l T h e o r y as Apologetics
T h e Source of All G o o d
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:16-20)
Gr.Naz.Or.4.44
(SC 309:144-46)
Gr.Nyss.Be^.4
{PG 44:1244)
Gr.Nyss.Cant.i
{Jaeger 6:16)
Gr.Nyss.Cant.4
(Jaeger 6:117)
Gr.Nyss.Apoll.
(Jaeger 3-I-.n0)
Gr.Nyss.Canf.2
(Jaeger 6:60)
Gr.Nyss. Or.dom. 1
(PG 44:1132)
Gr.Nyss.Beat.z
(PG 44:1216)
Gr.Nyss. Cant.j
(Jaeger 6:230)
Bas.Sp!>.8.i8
(SC 17:310)
Gr.Nyss. V.Mos.
(Jaeger 7-1:43)
145
146
Gr.Nyss. V(>g. 11
(Jaeger 8-1:292)
Gr.Nyss. Beat. 3
(PG 44:1225)
Gr.Nyss. Virg. 23
(Jaeger 8-1:334)
ap.Gr.Nyss.EwM.3.9.59
(Jaeger 2:286)
Bas.Ep.203.3
(Courtonne 2:175)
Gr.Nyss. Beat. 1
(PG 44:1196)
Gr.Nyss. V.Mos. 2
(Jaeger 7-1:52)
Gr.Nyss. Ep. 2.7-15
(Jaeger 8 - l I : i 5 - i 8 )
Gr.Naz. Cartn. 1.11.3 2 7 429 (PG 37:1052-59)
Otis 1961,14665
Spidlfk 1976,358-64
Gr.Naz.Or.4.113
(SC 309:270)
Nothomb 1954,318-21
N a t u r a l T h e o r y as Apologetics
the eye could see was all that most people ever beheld. Yet that
beauty was "only the material, waiting to be worked upon by the
idea of beauty"; this "idea of beauty" was visible to anyone "with
a clear mind's eye to inspect such appearances," who could therefore make use of visible beauty as "the ladder by which to climb
to the prospect of that intellectual beauty [pros ten tou noetou
theorian kallous], the source for the existence and name of all
other beauties." Similarly, an analysis of the language of apophasis led to the conclusion that it was possible for the human
mind to formulate "some idea of the greatness of what we have
sought by the very fact of our having been unable to perceive it."
The "idea of beauty" and the "idea of greatness" were thus essential elements of "moral and natural philosophy," but they were
also inadequate. For it was equally necessary to insist that "any
theory divorced from living examples [dicha ton ergon theoroumenos], however admirably dressed out," was an artificial
construct, "like the unbreathing statue." This apologetic principle was directed also against the supposition of some thinkers
about a "piety consisting in doctrines only." For that reason it
constituted an embarrassment to those Christian believers who
were mistakenly "isolated from the whole world and not
ashamed of [their] solitariness," when "the Gentiles, though ignorant of God," exhibited, on the basis of their natural knowledge, a more refined social consciousness than the Christians did,
forming associations with one another and seeking mutual contact. In so doing they were giving evidence of a truth about arete
that appeared to be available both to natural theology and to
revealed theology: "The distribution of arete is such that it is
shared out to all who seek after it, and yet it is wholly present to
each, without being diminished by those who share in it." In this
it was like the light of the sun, in which anyone could share
without depriving anyone else. Yet none of this was intended to
deny the moral and religious dangers that lurked especially in
social relations at highly populated places, as Gregory of Nyssa
warned after having visited even the holy city of Jerusalem and as
Gregory of Nazianzus also lamented on the basis of his own
struggles between the contemplative life of the monk and the
active life of the bishop.
Above all in systems of ethics, "theory" and "practice" had to
be inseparable. The test of any such system, whether natural or
revealed, was its application in the concrete situations of human
life and society. Concerning family ethics, for example, there was
T h e Source of All G o o d
Bas.ffoc.9.4
(SC 26:498)
Eph 6:4
Gr.Naz.Or.4.121
(SC 309:286-88)
Troeltsch 1960,12932
Ettlinger 1985,368-72
Gr.Naz.Or.37.6
(SC 318:282-84)
Bas.Hex.9.4
(SC 26:498)
Bas.p.i88.2
(Courtonne 2:125)
Gr.Nyss. Maced.
(Jaeger 3 - I : i o i )
147
a considerable amount of congruence between natural and revealed norms. "Does not nature say the same?" Basil could ask,
after quoting the New Testament teaching about the family. But
the Cappadocians also took advantage of the circumstance that
in practice this norm of natural law was frequently violated or
ignored in the Classical tradition, even when "reason" affirmed
it. Christian apologists, and then Christian legislators, took
strong positions against what they took to be the all but universal
acceptance of the double standard within Classical culture. "In
respect to chastity," Gregory of Nazianzus declared, "I see that
the majority of men are ill-disposed and that their laws are unequal and irregular." "What was the reason," he continued,
"that they restrained the woman, and indulged the man?" If a
woman was unfaithful, she was branded as "an adulteress" and
was subjected to severe penalties by pagan law; but a husband
who violated the marriage vow did not bring a similar censure
upon himself. Gregory concluded: "I do not accept this legislation; I do not approve this custom." And although he went on to
contrast this with revealed legislation about sexual morality, it
was clear from his method of argumentation that he was rejecting
the double standard on natural no less than on revealed grounds.
Therefore, he could have asked, in the words of Basil, "Does not
nature say the same?"
The relation between natural and revealed norms was less
clear in the discussion of what was already one of the most vexing
issues in sexual ethics, the question of abortion. Basil could say
outright: "The woman who purposely destroys her unborn child
is guilty of murder"; and he could dismiss out of hand any "nice
inquiry as to the formed or unformed fetus." This judgment was
not accompanied by any reference to Scripture or Christian tradition, but it was not validated on natural grounds either, except for
the chilling observation, "In most such cases women who make
such attempts die." His brother Gregory, by contrast, almost as
though he were instituting just such a "nice inquiry as to the
formed or unformed fetus," was willing, in the course of making
a quite unrelated point in connection with the doctrine of the
Holy Spirit, to assert almost apodictically: "It would not be possible to style the unformed embryo [to antelesphoreton embryon]
a human being, but only a potential one [dynameon], assuming
that it is completed so as to come forth to human birth, while as
long as it is in this unformed state [en toi atelei], it is something
other than a human being." And this, too, seems to have been
intended as a judgment based on reason rather than only on
148
Gr.Nyss.Hom.opif.i6
(PG 44:181)
Danielou 1956,7178
Gr.Nyss.Wrg.7
(Jaeger 8-1:282)
Gr.Nyss.En.1.527
(Jaeger 1:178-79)
Arist.Po/.i254a
Bas.5p1r.zo.51
(5C 17:426)
Gr.Naz.Or.37.13
(50318:296-98)
N a t u r a l T h e o r y as Apologetics
T h e Source of All G o o d
Ps 8:7-9
Gr.Nyss.Or.rfom.5
(PG 44:1189)
Geoghegan 1945,17581
Giet 1948,56-61
Gr.Nyss.Beat.4
(PG 44:1233-36)
Gr.Nyss.w.i.52.7
(Jaeger 1:178-79)
Gr.Naz.Or.16.15
(PG 35:961)
Gr.Naz.Ep.37.1
(Gallay 1:46)
Gr.Naz.GY.4.81
(SC 309:204-6)
149
150
Gr.Naz.Or.4.91
(SC 309:228)
Gr.Naz.Or.4.45
(SC 309:146)
Gr.Naz.Or.32.2
(SC 318:86)
Gr.Naz.or.32.8-12
(SC 318:100112)
Gr.Naz.or.32.9
(SC 318:104)
Gr.Naz.Or.16.19
(PG 35:961)
Gr.Nyss.EKH. 2.377
(Jaeger 1:336)
Gr.Nyss. Maced.
(Jaeger 3-1:316)
Gr.Nyss.Eww. 3.7.19-20
(Jaeger 2:22122)
Gr.Nyss.Mtfceif.
(Jaeger 3-1:91)
Gr.Nyss. Horn. opif. 16
(PG 44:185)
N a t u r a l T h e o r y as Apologetics
in the ironic words of Nazianzen, admired "this philosopherking." For the Platonic doctrine of the philosopher-king, which,
in the abstract if not in the concrete, Gregory seemed to be treating positively here, meant that the political decisions of a ruler
were to be made in the light of rational and natural principles, not
that such principles should be invoked to promote the advancement of evil rather than its repression in favor of the highest good
of society. "And what is the highest good according to our reason?" Gregory of Nazianzus asked. "Peace," he replied. Expanding on this answer, he delivered a lengthy encomium of peace and
"order [he taxis]." It was order that had "set us apart from
irrational creatures, and populated cities, and established laws,
and crowned arete with honor, and suppressed wickedness, and
invented the arts, and achieved social harmony." Only after this
celebration of order for what it had been able to achieve in the
realm of natural law and natural theology, in society and in the
cosmos, did he turn to its sublime expression in the ordered
society of the church. The perfection of the church as this divine
society, moreover, was to be attained only in the consummation of the kingdom of God, "that true and unapproachable
kingdom."
Every good, therefore, found its consummation and its perfection in the goal of ultimate good, just as it found its origin in the
source of all good; and these two, the source and the goal, were
one, in the perfection that was God. To deity it belonged to have
"justice, goodness, eternity, incapacity for eviland infinite perfection in all conceivable goodness." That correlation of "good"
and "perfection" in God meant: "Deity exhibits perfection in
every line in which the good can be found." But because anyone
"endowed with reason" had to know that "terms expressing
temporal interval" did not suit "the Lord who was before times
and before aeons," perfection needed to be defined differently
when it was applied to God. What made the divine nature "itself
the fullness of all goods" was this very fact: "It needs no addition
for its perfecting, but is, of itself and by its own nature, the
perfection of all good [he tou agathou teleiotes]," not at the end
of a process of change and development but eternally. A nature
that was "simple, uniform, and noncomposite" had to involve,
"by the implication of that very name, the perfection in it of every
conceivable thing befitting deity." The creation of Adam had
included the creation of the entire human race, in goodness and
innocencebut not, strictly speaking, in perfection. For "perfec-
Gr.Nyss.Eww.3.2.87
(Jaeger 2:81)
Gr.Nyss.V.Mos.3
(Jaeger 7-1:144-45)
I51
CHAPTER
10
(SC 2.6:110)
15Z
Gr.Naz.Or.37.14
(SC 318:302)
Gr.Nyss.Infant.
(Jaeger 3-11:93)
Gr.Nyss.Beat.6
(PG 44:1*68)
Gr.Nyss.Cant.4
(Jaeger 6:117)
Jfi 14:6
Bas.Sp<>.8.i8
(SC 17:310)
153
154
nature and its origins, had fallen into one error after another,
from atomism to materialism, with each such error then going on
to be "overturned by its successors." But for all the differences of
opinion among them, it had been common to all these systems
that they were "deceived by their inherent atheism," which deluded them into supposing, on the basis of a mistaken view of
origins, "that there was nothing governing or ruling the universe,
Ens.Hex.i.z
(SCzfi:9z-94)
and that it was all given over to tyche." Cataloging the major
alternatives among these systems, Gregory of Nazianzus put their
teleology (or lack of it) into the context of their several worldviews. First, in an apparent attack on the Platonists, he listed
those whom he charged with "thinking up imaginary republics
fplattousi poleis,' the evident play on words between 'Platon'
and 'plattein' being untranslatable], fine-sounding in the description [logoi] but unachievable in fact [ergoi]." He went on to
speak of those whom he accused of "all but worshiping august
tyrannies"; although the reference was not at all clear, he may
possibly have been referring here to Aristotle and his followers
and pupils, who included Alexander the Great. Then there were,
he continued, "the deniers of any god at all, or of a providence
[ou pronoein] over events, believers in a universe borne along by
luck and tyche." Next there were those who maintained that
things were being "led along by the stars and by the configurations [schematismois] of ananke;" he added that he did not know
"by whom and from where these configurations in turn" were
being impelled, according to their system. And finally, there were
some who taught that everything was "motivated by pleasure [eis
hedonen], as the goal [peras] of human life," which seems to have
Gr.Naz.Or.4.44
(sc 309:144)
Amand de Mendieta
1973,393-98,405-39
XT u
1986
Green 1990,400
Green 1990,586
ap.Th.1.140
Pl.Ap.33c
PI.R.617C
Pl.Lg.806a
Pl.Lg.709b-c
Gr.Naz.Or.40.17
(PG 36:380-81)
Bidez 1938,1921
Nock 1972,1:121
Nock 1933,100
Bas.Ep.i
(Courtonne 1:3)
Bas.Ep.236.5
(Courtonne 3:53)
Gr.Nyss.Ewtt.3.9.50
(Jaeger 2:282-83)
155
i56
Gr.Nyss.CdM.5
(Jaeger 6:i6e>6i)
Gr.Nyss.Or.tiom.3
(PG 44:1156)
Gr.Naz.Or.37.14
(SC 318:302)
Gr.Nyss.Or.catech.;.}
(Meridier 26)
Seepp.2.56-59
Gai'th 1953,87-94
Cumont 1960,76
Courtonne 1934,99110
Gr.Nyss.M. 1.3 88
(Jaeger 1:140)
Gr.Nyss.Eww.2.71
(Jaeger 1:247-48)
Gr.Naz.Or.7.7
(PG 35:761)
Gn 1:14
esis that this lot in life, whether of virtue or of vice, was "decided
by ananke" rather than by a God who desired only an arete that
was "free of coercion," which meant that it was also free of his
own coercion. As "the one true and perfect power, above all
things and governing the whole universe," God did not rule "by
violence and tyrannical dictatorship [biai tini kai tyrannikei dynasteiai]," nor through the overpowering force of "intimidation
and ananke." If this were not true and if determinism were,
human effort and human thought would be useless. Useless, too,
would be the very idea of the image of God, for it was impossible
for "such a nature, subject to ananke and in servitude, to be
called an image of the sovereign nature" of God, which was
totally free. More outrageous still would be any suggestion that
in making this world rather than some other possible world even
God the Creator had not acted out of a free and sovereign love but
had been driven by an external "ananke in forming humanity,"
and that therefore creation was not contingent, because God was
not free and sovereign.
Such theories of deterministic necessity tried to lay claim to a
scientific basis by appealing to the alleged influence of the stars;
for it was during these centuries that, in Franz Cumont's formulation, "in place of the old methods of divination, now fallen into
discredit, of deceitful portents and ambiguous oracles, astrology
promised to substitute a scientific method, founded on experience of almost infinite duration." To the Cappadocians this use of
astronomy to validate astrology was a distortion of the fundamental scientific imperative to "investigate nature's work." In its
proper expression, that imperative led to insights into the structure and motion of the heavenly bodies, and through such insights to admiration for the work of the Creatoralways accompanied, of course, by the reverent admission that the "essential
nature" of the Creator remained unknowable. Such use of astronomy could be "helpful," but this "science" could become "dangerous" when it led someone to "attribute all happenings and all
existing things to the influence of the stars." It was an "overstepping of the borders" scientifically and epistemologically, and a
false interpretation of the biblical teaching that the stars had been
given "for signs [eis semeia]," for someone to "cast horoscopes,"
on the mistaken supposition of "a dependency of our lives upon
the motion of the heavenly bodies, enabling the astrologers to
read our future in the planets." This astrological theorizing led to
the mistaken belief, as quoted by Basil: "When the planets cross
in the signs of the Zodiac, certain figures formed by their meeting
Bas.Hex.6.5
(SC 26:348)
Bas.Hex.6.7
(SC 26:356-62)
Gr.Nyss.V.Mos.2
(Jaeger 7-1:43)
Gr.Naz.Or.4.31
(SC 309:i28)ep
Gr.Naz.Or.5.5
(SC 309:302)
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:105)
Bas.Hex.1.6
(SC 26:110)
Gr.Nyss.V.Mos.2
(Jaeger 7-1:141)
Gr.Nyss.Gmr.9
(Jaeger 6:280)
Balas 1966
Gr.Nyss.Cant.i
(Jaeger 6:39)
Bas.Leg.lib.gent.8
(Wilson z8)
157
158
N a t u r a l Theology as Apologetics
Gr.Naz.Ep.ioi
(PG 37:192.)
Or.Ce/s.4.67
(GCS 2 : 3 3 7 )
occur and others to be omitted," but it also meant that the events
of both sacred and secular history were to be seen as subject to
cyclical repetition. In opposition to the Classical theories of cycles stood the assertion, as Charles Norris Cochrane formulated
it on the basis of Latin Christian thought in his Christianity and
Classical Culture: "Notwithstanding all appearances, human
history does not consist of a series of repetitive patterns, but
marks a sure, if unsteady, advance to an ultimate goal." Basil
sought to show that by their organic structures and by the idiosyncracies of their anatomies, which he recounted in great scientific detail, various animals, from elephants to scorpions, gave
evidence of this teleology. "In creation," he insisted, "nothing
exists without a reason." And again a little later, "Nothing
has been done without motive, nothing by chance [apo tautomatou]."
Cochrane 1944,484
Bas.Hex.9.5
(SC 26:502-10)
Bas.Hex.5.4
(SC 2.6:2.91-94)
Bas.Hex.5.8
[SC 26:314)
Gr.Nyss.fa/ant.
(Jaeger 3-11:72)
Pl.Lg.709bc
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:105)
Mt 13:39
Gr.Nyss.Gjt5
(Jaeger 6:155-56)
Gr.Nyss.7tt/awt
(Jaeger 3-11:72)
Gr.Nyss.Cawf.12
(Jaeger 6:362)
Bas./?.5.2
(Courtonne 1:1718)
Gr.Naz.Or.17.4
(PG 35:969)
Qe^P57B5t6
(PG 44:1169-72)
jft
(Jaeger 311:76)
GrN
..
. , ,
(jaeger 3-11:90)
G N
(Jaeger 8-1:171)
159
to
Anim.res. (PG46:110-11)
Gr N ss v.Mos z
(Jaeger 7-1:56)
m a n nves
..
Gr.Nyss.Beat.5
(PG 44:1253-56)
i6o
Florovsky 9:39
Gr.Nyss.Hom.opif. 16
(PG 44:184)
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:21)
Gr.Nyss.7n/BKt.
(Jaeger 3-11:93)
OCD 1100IIOI;445
Soz.H.e.5.4
(GCS 50:197)
Gr.Naz.Or.18.34
(PG 35:1029)
Gr.Nyss.Hex.
(PG 44:73)
Bas.Hex.1.2
(SC 26:92-94)
Gr.Nyss.w.2.222 23
(Jaeger 1:290)
Yet human freedom did not imply divine caprice, and it would
be the worst possible misunderstanding to conclude, from this
preeminence of free will among all the qualities of human personality, that Cappadocian natural theology implied the sacrifice of
order to freedom as a way of avoiding fatalism. Their opposition
to philosophies of tyche and chance was no less thoroughgoing
than was their rejection of deterministic necessity. In the fundamental statement of his natural theology voicing that opposition,
as quoted earlier, Gregory of Nyssa declared: "That nothing happens without God [to meden atheei ginesthai] we know from
many sources; and, conversely, that God's economy has no element of tyche and irrationality in it, everyone will allow who
realizes that God is reason, and sophia, and perfect arete, and
truth." Among the deities of Greek polytheism was the goddess
Tyche, who during the Hellenistic and Roman periods had been
conflated with the Roman goddess Fortuna. According to the
church historian Sozomen, "The pagan temple dedicated to
Tyche, the only one remaining in the city [of Caesarea], was
overturned by the Christians after the accession [of the emperor
Julian]; and on hearing of the deed, he hated the entire city intensely." But to Gregory of Nazianzus, this act of destruction
sometime after Julian's accession in 361 amounted to a declaration of freedom from the tyranny of random chance and luck. For
the rejection of that tyranny was a consequence of the acceptance
not simply of the authority of Christian revelation but of the
universally valid principle of natural theology that there was
"nothing of irrationality or fortune or chance [alogon kai syntychikon kai automaton]" in God and in the actions that came
from God. Belief that there was such a force as chance in the
founding of the cosmos had led the natural philosophers and
scientists among the Greeks astray. The very "system of the
heavens" demonstrated that it was impossible for "any existing
thing to have its being from chance or accident." For once the
principle of chance had been introduced as an explanation for the
Macnap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:1117)
Gr.Nyss.ffex
(PG 44:72.)
Gr.Nyss.Ewtt. 1.526
(Jaeger 1:178)
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:117)
Gr.Nyss.Virg.z3
(Jaeger 8-1:334)
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss. V.Macr.
(Jaeger 8-1:390)
Jb 37;Mt 16:2-3
Gr.Naz.Or.16.5
(PG 35:940)
See pp.32426
161
N a t u r a l Theology as Apologetics
G n 1:1
Bas.Hex.1.3
(SC 26:98100)
See pp.6569
Gr.Nyss. Infant.
(Jaeger 3-11:71)
Gr.Naz.Or.16.;
(PG 35:940)
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:128)
Gr.Nyss. Or.catecb.) 5.7
(Meridier 164)
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. [PG 46:68)
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss. V.Macr.
(Jaeger 8-1:390)
ferred from the structure of the world as cosmos. Not only the
creation narrative in the Book of Genesis but Aristotle in De
Caelo drew such a correlation of beginning and ending when he
declared: "Generated things are seen always to be destroyed."
From this it followed, according to Basil, who seemed to be quoting Aristotle: "What was begun in time is condemned to come to
an end in time; for if there has been a beginning, you should not
doubt of the end." There was a logical connection between the
two, such that a denial of the possibility of the end was also a
denial of the possibility of the beginning. But in the Cappadocian
system, the possibility of the beginning, in fact the certainty of a
beginning, was a logical and natural, not only a theological and
supernatural, certainty. Starting from that certainty, they came to
the doctrine of natural theology that in the universe there was a
"harmony of the whole," which involved the end no less than the
beginning, teleology no less than creation. There was a system
and government in the universe, from which the universe had
come, toward which it tended, and by which it was sustained. All
of this indicated that it had been "originally constituted, blended,
bound together, and set in motion in some sort of harmony,"
which was still being preserved even amid calamity and disaster.
Now, under the conditions of finite existence, there was evident
"some sort of deficiency in our race." But from the nature of
things it was possible to see "every intellectual reality fixed in a
plenitude [pleroma] of its own." Since that was the general rule,
Macrina could draw the conclusion: "It is reasonable to expect
that humanity [to anthropinon] also will arrive at a goal [eis
peras], for in this respect also humanity is not to be parted from
the intellectual world." In the consideration of that goal, it could
even be affirmed that the economy of divine providence had a
purpose in bringing death upon human nature.
Like the teleology of which it was the most comprehensive
expression, eschatology belonged in part to reason as well as to
revelation, and various of its components were to be found "both
in the pagan writings and in the divine writings [para te ton
exothen kai para tes theias graphes]." But all such "lofty philosophy," which gave the impression of being so well informed about
"the divine purpose," was qualified, as was every other theme of
Cappadocian natural theology, by the limitations of human
knowledge and by the requirements of apopbatic theology. A
recitation of the hope of the kingdom and of the expectation of
the end concluded that the description of such transcendent
Gt.Nyss.Hom.opif.
(PG 44:104)'
Gr.Naz.Or.16.5
(PG 35:940)
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:121)
Gr.Nyss.H0m.0pf/l21
(PG 44:208)
Gr.Nyss. Or.dom. 1
(PG 44:1124-25)
Bas.Ep.42.1
(Courtonne 1:100)
Phil 3:13-14
Gr.Nyss.Beat. 5
(PG 44:1248)
163
164
Gr.Nyss.Ctfwr.2
(Jaeger 6:6:60)
See p.328
Gr.Nyss.Hom. opif. 5
(PG 44:137)
Gr.Nyss.EMM.L29091
(Jaeger 1:112.)
Gr.Nyss.V.Mos.2.
(Jaeger 7-1:115)
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:96)
Gr.Nyss.Beaf.4
(PG 44:1244)
Mt5:6
Mt5:8
N a t u r a l Theology as Apologetics
(PG 44:1165)
..
,,,.
165
Gr.Nyss.KMos.2
(jaeger 7-L116)
.,
, .
Gr.Nyss.Cani.6
(Jaeger 6:178)
if,
N
(Jaeger 3-11:78-79)
.
(PG 36:317-2.0)
GrN
in reality [ontos], that the desire [for God] never finds satiety."
Without retracting anything that they had said about apophasis,
the Cappadocians thus found it possible to speak in "ontological" terms about "seeing God in reality [ontos]." Their teleology
was summed up in the vision of God, which was end and goal and
r
'
PART
TWO
Natural Theology as Presupposition
CHAPTER
11
Highet 1957,560
Armstrong 1984,1-17
T, .
Peterson 1951,45147;
'
149-64
'
I/O
N a t u r a l Theology as Presupposition
Cochrane 1944,26162
Gibbon i776,xxviii
(Bury 3:188)
Florovsky 8:155
Seeberg 1953,2:125
Hauser-Meury i960
Mateo-Seco-Bastero
1988,139-71
Gr.Naz.Or.21.14
(SC 270:138)
Gn 14:14
Ath.Ep.Afr.z
(PG 26:1032)
Gr.Nyss.Ep.5.1
(Jaeger 8-11:92)
Bas.Ep.258.2
(Courtonne 3:1012)
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:6972)
Asmus 1910,32567
Hauser-Meury i960,
1019
Cyr.Juln.
(PG 76:5091064)
Wright 1923,3:317
Ex 12:35-36
Gr.Nyss.V.Mos.i
(Jaeger 7 -I:68)
Gr.Naz.Or.42:io
(PG 36:469)
S6z.H.e.i.3
(GCS 50:51-54)
Meyendorff 1984,65-74
CCP(38i)can.3
(Alberigo-Jedin 32)
Grillmeier-Bacht 195154,2:459-90
171
lian's polemic, Wilmer Cave Wright, has said, "we should have a
very vague idea of Julian's treatise, and as it is we are compelled to
see it through the eyes of a hostile apologist." Although he did not
write a refutation of Julian, Gregory of Nyssa was well aware of
what it meant, during the age of Constantine and then again
during that of Theodosius the Great, for Christian theology to be
taking possession of Classical culture, and to be doing so (invoking another typology) in the same way that the Israelites at the
Exodus had taken possession of the riches of the Egyptiansas
reparations rather than as booty.
Effectively as well as symbolically, the embodiment of this
triumph of Christian theology over Classical culture, and of this
possession of Classical culture by Christian theology, was Constantine's crowning achievement, the founding of New Rome, the
city of Constantinople, in the year 330. The historian Sozomen,
writing a century or so later, spoke of Constantinople as "this
newly compacted city of Christ," and characterized it as unique
among the metropolitan centers of the Mediterranean world in
that it had never been "polluted by altars, Grecian temples, nor
sacrifices," because it had not been transformed from a pagan to
a Christian city, as Rome and Alexandria had but had been founded as a Christian capital. Except for Julian's short-lived (361
363) "introduction of idolatry," as Sozomen called it, Constantinople was and remained a Christian city, the capital of a Christian empire, and went on being that for eleven centuries, the
longest uninterrupted reign in the political history of Christendom, East or West. In recognition of its special position, the
ecumenical Council of Constantinople in 381 declared: "The
bishop of Constantinople has the primacy of honor after the
bishop of Rome, because it is the New Rome [ton mentoi Konstantinoupoleos episkopon echein ta presbeia tes times meta ton
Romes episkopon, dia to einai auten nean Romen]."
The constitutional implications of this canonand of the similar but still more controversial so-called twenty-eighth canon of
the Councilof Chalcedonin45ifor the jurisdictional relations
between the patriarch of Constantinople as New Rome and the
patriarch of Old Rome have, for understandable reasons, engaged the attention of historians of canon law. For our purposes
here, these celebrations of Constantinople were important
. chiefly because of its cultural rather than its canonical primacy.
On this score at any rate, such a primacy of Constantinople also
over Rome, as a center both of Christian culture and of the Classical tradition, was never in serious question, either in the East
172.
N a t u r a l Theology as Presupposition
Hod 1928,40917
Gr.Naz.Or.41.10
(PG 36:469)
Gibbon 1776, xxvii
(Bury 3:150)
Bernardi 1968,2x6-35
Gr.Naz.Or.7.8
{PG 35:764)
Gr.Naz.Or.43.14
(PG 36:513)
Gr.Naz.Or.42.11
{PG 36:47*)
Gr.Naz.Or.25.13
(50284:186)
Delehaye 1921,323
Gr.Naz.Or.24.6
(SC 284:50)
Gr.Naz.Or.42.10
(PG 36:469)
Gr.Naz.Or.42. ji
(PG 36:468)
Gr.Nyss. V.Mos.2
(Jaeger 7 -I:68)
Gr.Nyss.Gmr.13
(Jaeger 6:376)
Gr.Naz.Or.29.21
(SC 250:224)
Fedwick 1978,6467
DTC 14^29798
Bas.p.i88.i
(Courtonne 2:121)
Ex 32:1-6
Gr.Nyss. V.Mos.
(Jaeger 7-1:38)
173
has not taken pleasure in numbers. . . . For nothing is so magnificent in God's sight as pure doctrine, and a soul perfect in all the
dogmas of the truth."
The triumph of theology in the fourth century, therefore, was
not only its appropriation of Classical culture. It was as well the
victory of this "pure doctrine" and of these "dogmas of the truth"
over impure doctrine and heresy. In the eyes of the Cappadocians,
these two victories were closely related, ultimately perhaps identical, for it was a characteristic of many errors that they were
simultaneously "philosophical and heretical," propounded by
pagans and by false Christians. When the Cappadocians were
refuting such an error either in its philosophical or in its heretical
formulation, consequently, they were often addressing both. This
was the obverse side of the principle of "faith as the fulfillment of
our reasoning": the false theological faith of the heretic, too, was
the fulfillment of his false philosophical reasoning. But the false
philosophy did not of itself produce "heresy" in the strict sense of
the word; according to the distinction formulated by Basil and
eventually adopted as standard in East and West, "heretics" were
to be defined as "men altogether broken off and alienated in
matters relating to the actual faith" on which there could be no
compromise, by contrast with "schismatics," who were to be
seen as "men separated for some ecclesiastical reasons and questions capable of mutual solution" and compromise. Only in the
context of the true faith, and in antithesis to it, did such heresies
arise, as the sin of the people of Israel at Mount Sinai had demonstrated. They fell into the gravest worship of false gods and the
idolatry of the golden calf at the very time when they had received
the revelation of the true God through his servant Moses. The
Cappadocians insisted, moreover, that this emphasis on purity of
doctrine was not to lead to an exclusive emphasis on doctrine at
the expense of liturgy and sacraments, which was the overemphasis that they claimed to find in the heretic Eunomius.
When they confronted this heretical version of the quest for pure
doctrine, they turned to the device of apophasis, which was so
important also as a weapon in their conflict with pagan religion.
See pp.4056
174
.T _
(sc 2.70:186)
N
(SC 247:198)
-,..,
Gibbon I776,xxvu
(Bury 3:150)
N
(SC 270:118-20)
N
_
(sc 250:72-76)
_ .. _
Gr.Naz.Or.42.18
(PG 36:480)
'
bles." "At the present time," he admitted, "there are some who
go to war even about trivial matters and to no purpose . . . but
make faith the pretext." So bitter were some of his descriptions of
the quarrels among the theologians that Gibbon could point out
with glee: "A suspicion may possibly arise that so unfavourable a
picture of ecclesiastical synods has been drawn by the partial
hand of some obstinate heretic or some malicious infidel," when
it fact it had come from "one of the most pious and eloquent
bishops of the age, a saint and a doctor of the church, the scourge
of Arianism, and the pillar of the orthodox faith . . . in a word
'
Gr.Naz.Or.21.24
(SC 270:160)
Gr.Nyss.Ep.2
(Jaeger 8-11:13-19);
Gr.Naz.Or.42.26
(PG 36:489)
Cochrane 1944,21360
Ten.Praescrip. 7.9
(CCSL 1:193)
Gr.Naz.Or.43.13
(PG 36:512)
Gr.Naz.Or.43.14
(PG 36:513)
Gr.Naz.Or.43.15 ;43.24
(PG 36:513-16:529)
Gr.Naz.Ctfrm.2.21164
(PG 37:1044-47)
Gr.Naz.Or.42.11
(PG 36:471)
Giet 19413,23246;
Jaeger 1961,86102
175
however great his boorishness and lack of education [amathestatos], is allowed to be ignorant of the Roman law, and while
there is no law in favor of sins of ignorance, the teachers of the
mysteries of salvation should be ignorant of the arcbai of salvation, however simple and shallow their minds may be in regard to
other subjects?"
At the same time, the Cappadocians' enthusiastic celebration
of Constantinople as the political, military, and intellectual symbol of the triumph of Christian theology over Classical culture
must not be permitted to obscure the mystique that continued to
hover over Athens in their intellectual universe, which was in
some respects analogous to the special place that Jerusalem held
for them. Indeed, in paraphrase of the familiar question of Tertullian's Prescription against Heretics, "What has Athens to do
with Jerusalem [Quid Athenae Hierosolymis]?" the Cappadocians sometimes seemed to be asking, "What has Constantinople
to do with Athens?" The moving biographical memoir of Basil
composed by Gregory of Nazianzus some time after Basil's death
provided special documentation of this theme. Describing Basil's
earliest education, Gregory spoke of the "illustrious city " of Caesarea as "the metropolis of letters," with a "distinction formed
by literature." That description of Caesarea served as a foil for the
next stage of Basil's schooling: "Thence to Byzantium, the imperial city of the East, for it was distinguished by the eminence of its
rhetorical and philosophic teaching." But even this became a foil:
"Thence he was sent by God, and by his generous craving for
culture, to Athens, the very home of literatureAthens, which
has been to me, if it has to anyone, a city truly of gold, and the
patroness of all that is good." Returning to the matter a little
later, Gregory, having criticized "the young men at Athens" for
being, "in their folly, mad after rhetorical skill," nevertheless
acknowledged wistfully: "There is nothing so painful to anyone
as is separation from Athens and one another, for those who have
been comrades there." His poetic memoir, many years later, of
his student days at Athens echoed this wistful tone.
It was important to make clear that simple Christian believers,
too, were orthodox, often more so than were speculative
thinkers. Yet it was equally clear that orthodox theology as a
scientific discipline required a high level of education in the Classical as well as in the Christian tradition, and therefore the Cappadocians as orthodox Christian theologians repeatedly addressed themselves to the philosophy of education. Gregory of
Nazianzus was speaking for all of them when, in agreement with
i7
Gr.Naz.Or.43.II
(PG 36:508)
Gr.Naz.Ep.39.3
(Gallay 1:48)
Hauser-Meury
1960,134-35
Gr.Naz.O.18.10
(PG 35:996)
Gr.Nyss.V.Mos.2
(Jaeger 7-1:37)
Gr.Nyss.EwK. 3.1.2.
(Jaeger 1:3-4)
Gr.Naz.Or.z9.z1
(SC Z50:zz4)
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:zi)
Bas.Spir.17.4
(SC 17:396)
Juln.Imp.ap.Gr.Naz.
Or.4.102 (SC 309^50)
Gr.Naz.Or.4.103
(50309:251-54)
N a t u r a l Theology as Presupposition
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:52.)
Gr.Naz.Or.36.4
(50318:248-50)
Gr.Nyss. Or.dom.5
(PG 44:1188)
Gr.Naz.Or.43.11
(PG 36:508-9)
Gr.Naz.Or.21.6
(SC 270:120)
Gr.Naz.Or.43.13
(PG 36:512)
Bas.Ep.74.3
(Courtonne 1:175)
Bartelink 1960,48692
Malingrey 1961,207-35
177
T75T
Eun.ap.Gr.Nyss.K.
2.196 (Jaeger 1:282);
Gr.Nyss.M.3.6.56
(Jaeger 2:206)
Col 2:8
1 Tm 3:7
Kurmann 1988,14446
Gr.Naz.Or.4.43
(SC 309:142-44)
PI.Grg.5o8a;Pl..52 7 b;
Pl.Grg.474b
Gr.Naz.Or.5.30
($0309:354)
Gr.Naz.Ep.101
(PG 37:183)
Malingrey 1961,21721
Gr.Naz.Or.36.12
(50318:266)
Eccl 1:2
Gr.Nyss.EwM.3.2.35
(Jaeger 2:63)
Bas.Hex.3.8
(SO 2 6 : 2 3 2 - 3 4 )
Bas.Hex.1.10
(SC 26:130)
N a t u r a l Theology as Presupposition
point for any consideration of the Cappadocian term "philosophia" must be its Greek and Classical provenance, that is, its
original status asin a phrase that the Cappadocians and their
heretical opponents seem to have shared"the philosophy from
the outside [he exothen philosophia]." That phrase was conflated
from several passages of the New Testament, especially from
two: Paul's warning against being spoiled by "philosophy and
vain deceit," and his reference to "those on the outside [hoi
exothen]." Just when each of the Three Cappadocians was in his
young manhood, the intellectual standing of this Classical pagan
philosophy received significant political and social reinforcement, for twenty months at any rate, through its official revival
during the emperorship of Julian, the sometime Christian, whose
religious syncretism found its counterpart in his encouragement
of many different (and in some ways mutually contradictory)
philosophical systems, with all their disquisitions about "the
equality of geometry" and about "justice." It was specifically in
this context that some of the most extreme aspersions upon pagan philosophy appeared in Cappadocian thought and rhetoric. Challenging Julian, "the crowned sophist," Gregory of
Nazianzus drew a contrast between the "invincible syllogisms
and enthymemes" of the emperor's pagan philosophers and "the
fishermen and peasants" who had accepted the gospel. He was
employing another stock rhetorical formula when he described
himself as "someone lacking in philosophy and paideia"; the
term "philosophy" here seems to have been used in the sense of
"general culture." The so-called wise men and philosophers of
Classical thought were in fact nothing of the kind, he contended.
Echoing the opening lament of Solomon in the Book of Ecclesiastes about "futility, utter futility [mataitotes mataioteton],"
Gregory of Nyssa dismissed Classical philosophy and cosmology
as "Greek futility [he Hellenike mataiotes]." Also in the course of
a consideration of cosmological philosophy, Basil contrasted
"the inquisitive discussions of philosophers about the heavens"
with "the simple and inartificial character of the utterances of the
Spirit" in the creation narrative of Genesis. In this he was carrying
out the admonition he had voiced earlier in his commentary on
the Hexaemeron: "At all events let us prefer the simplicity of faith
to the demonstrations of reason [ei de me, alia to ge haploun tes
pisteos ischyroteron esto ton logikon apodeixeon]."
All of these contrasts between Classical Greek philosophia
and Christian doctrine were part of the Cappadocian campaign
of natural theology as apologetics, but they were also an integral
1 Cor 1:20
Gr.Nyss.EttM. 3.8.43
(Jaeger 2:255)
Bas.Ep.90.2
(Courtonne 1:19596)
Bas.p.8.2
(Courtonne 1:23)
Malingrey 1961,21213
Eun.ap.Gr.Nyss.Ezm.
2.196 (Jaeger 1:282)
Gr.Nyss.EHK.3.6.56
(Jaeger 2:206)
Bas.SpiV.2.5
(SC 17:264)
Gr.Nyss.Vfrg.16
(Jaeger 8-1:314)
Gr.Nyss.Gjttf.13
(Jaeger 6:394)
Gr.Naz.Or.4.60
(50307:166-68)
Gr.Naz.Or.25.1
(SC 284:156)
Gr.Nyss.V.Mos.2
(Jaeger 7-1:138)
179
element in the Cappadocian presentation and defense of Christian doctrine, natural theology as presupposition. Disavowing
any suggestion of a "fellowship between the creed of Christians
and a sophia discredited through being made foolish," Gregory
of Nyssa ruled out of consideration, in the inquiry into authentic
Christian teaching, the question of whether certain theories were
acceptable "to some of the sages 'on the outside'"; that question
was irrelevant to the determination of the meaning of "the Gospels or the rest of the teaching of the Holy Scriptures." Therefore,
he urged, "Let us bid farewell to such philosophy!" A failure to
do so, according to Basil, elevated "the sophia of this world" over
"the dogmas of the fathers [ta ton pateron dogmata]" and "apostolic traditions." Having made that choice, the heretics had it as
"their object not to teach simple souls lessons drawn from Holy
Scripture, but to mar the harmony of the truth by heathen
sophia.'" That "sophia from the outside" or "philosophy from
the outside [he exothen philosophia]" was what Eunomius accused Basil of accepting. But Eunomius was, in turn, charged by
the Cappadocians with having introduced arguments into his
own theology based on the "sophia from the outside." Other
heretics, too, such as the Macedonians or Pneumatomachoi in
their doctrine of the Holy Spirit, had been "led into their error by
their close study of outside writers [he ton exothen parateresis],"
specifically by philosophical doctrines of causation.
But amid all this polemic the Cappadocians never forgot that
authentic "philosophia," as the love of sophia, took its content
from the content of sophia itself, which, for the Cappadocians,
was not merely a divine attribute among other attributes but
divinity itself. "God is not pain any more than he is pleasure,"
Gregory of Nyssa explained; but he went on to assert that God
was to be identified as, among other titles, "autosophia," sophia
itself. Therefore "philosophia," as the love of this "autosophia,"
was, in some ultimate sense, the same as the love of God. To
become this, however, philosophy needed to recognize that it was
incomplete without "authentic religious devotion [he alethine
eusebeia]," as this was taught and practiced by the Christian
faith. When it was combined with such devotion, as Gregory
Nazianzus declared to Julian, it produced "those who are authentically lovers of wisdom and lovers of God [hoi alethos philosophoi kai philotheoi]." Thus, introducing a panegyric to a
certain Maximus, he could employ "philosopher" simply as a
synonym for "Christian." What such thinkers expounded, then,
was "the authentic philosophy [he alethe philosophia]." The
i8o
Gr.Nyss.Paup. i
(Van Heck 5)
Malingrey 1961,22527
Gr.Nyss.Cant.z
(Jaeger 6:44)
Gr.Nyss.Het.pr.
(PG 44:64)
Gr.Nyss.Eun.i.io
(Jaeger 1:25)
Gr.Naz.OK4.73
(SC 309:188)
Gr.Nyss.H*.
(PG 44:65)
Gr.Naz.Or.42.11
(PG 36:472)
Gr.Nyss.Or.rfom.4
(PG44:ii69;ii76)
Arist.Ate.io64a
Gr.Naz.Or.4.13
(SC 309:116)
Gr.Naz.Or.26.9
{SC 284:244)
Riedel 1898,66-74
Gr.Nyss.Ca(.pr.
(Jaeger 6:3)
Gr.Nyss.CtfK.5;i
(Jaeger 6:137:17)
Wis 13:19
Gr.Nyss.iiMM.3.3.5
(Jaeger 2:108-9)
Gr.Nyss.Caw/.i
(Jaeger 6:22)
N a t u r a l Theology as Presupposition
Eccl 5:1
Gr.Nyss..2.9394
(Jaeger 1:254)
Gr.Nyss. V.Mos.2
(Jaeger 7-1:99)
Gr.Naz.Or.2.78
(SC 247:192)
See pp.90106
Serra i955,337~74
Fox 1939,13740;
Giet I94ia,i83216
Janini Cuesta 1947,
352-62
Gr.Nyss. V/>g. 23
(Jaeger 8-1:333)
Jb 39:5-11
Gr.Naz.Or.26.13
(SC 284:256)
Gr.Nyss. V.Macr.
8-I:37i)
Gr.Naz.Or.43.13
(PG 36:512)
Gr.Nyss. V.Macr.
(Jaeger 8-1:377)
181
nition, "God is in heaven and you are on earth, so let your words
be few," the Solomonic philosophy was seen as one of apophatic
restraint. By the time the Cappadocians had worked out their
reinterpretation of "philosophia," they were also willing to reverse the polarity of the theoretical and the practical, paying
special attention to "the philosophical way of life [he philosophos diagoge]" exemplified by Moses. When Gregory of
Nazianzus wrote, "One branch of philosophy is too high for
me," he explained that he was talking not about contemplation
or speculation but about "the commission to guide and govern
souls." "Philosophia" here referred, therefore, not to the natural
philosophy of science and cosmology, nor even to metaphysics
(about both of which the Cappadocians made critical comments), but to pastoral care, to which Gregory of Nazianzus was
speaking in this passage, but with which Basilboth as bishop of
Caesarea and as monastic founderand Gregory of Nyssa as
well all dealt in their writings and careers.
"Philosophia" in this practical sense applied above all to the
practice of Christian discipline, especially the ascetic disciplines
of virginity and temperance. Celebrating its heroism with alpha
privatives, Gregory of Nazianzus exclaimed: "Nothing is more
unassailable than philosophy, nothing more incomprehensible!"
The Book of Job praised such animals as the wild ass and the
unicorn for their freedom from restraint, but they were symbolic.
For to the two beings that were truly "beyond being governed
[dyskrateta]," namely, God and angel, there had to be added "a
third, the philosophernonmaterial within matter, uncircumscribed within a body, heavenly while upon earth, possessing
apatheia within passions [aylos en hylei, en somati aperigraptos,
epi ges ouranios, en pathesin apathes]." Macrina had managed
heroically "by this kind of philosophy to raise herself to the
greatest height of human arete." It was to this practical discipline
of "philosophia" that Basil had come after passing through rhetoric. As Gregory of Nazianzus explained, "His purpose was 'philosophia,' and breaking from the world, and fellowship with
God, by concerning himself, amid things below, with things
above, and winning, where all is unstable and fluctuating, the
things that are stable and that abide." Although he had been
"puffed up beyond measure with the pride of oratory," Basil was
led by Macrina "toward the mark of philosophia." N o w that he
was set free, therefore, Basil was in a position to characterize
"philosophia" as the force that could "free our souls, as from a
N a t u r a l Theology as Presupposition
Y>as.Leg.lib.gent.<)
(Wilson 30-31)
Gr.Naz.Or.4.73
(50309:188)
Spidli'k 1976,358-64
See pp.i55~58
Gr.Naz.Of.37.14
(SC 318:302.)
Gr.Nyss.ZiMH.3.9.54
(Jaeger 1:284)
Gr.Nyss.Canr.6
(Jaeger 6:171-73)
Gr.Nyss.Canr.ii;i5
(Jaeger 6:333:457)
Gr.Naz.Or.42.11
(PG 36:472)
Gr.Naz.Or.28.1
(SC 250:100)
Gr.Naz.Or.27.3
(SC 250:76)
Guignet 1911,43-70
183
CHAPTER
12
Whitehead 1948,49-50
Gr.Nyss.n.i.i86
Gr N " X'AO 11
(Jaeger 3-i:i88)
,;.
(SC 270:184)
Florovsky 2:31-65
Buckley 1987,337-62
185
that, taken together, came to be defined as Christian orthodoxy. Because of the place of these fundamental assumptions in
the dogma of the fourth century and in the dogmatic theology of
the Cappadocians, they assumed a position of historical dominance for all the subsequent centuries of the history of the church,
up to and including the twentieth century. The controversy between Augustine and the Pelagians, the dogmatic debates between the Greek East and the Latin West, the doctrinal pluralism
of the later Middle Ages, the division of Western Christendom
during the age of the Reformation, the upheavals brought on by
the Enlightenment and by theological liberalism, the efforts in the
ecumenical movement to address these problemsthrough these
historic changes and many others, these "fundamental assumptions which adherents of all the variant systems within the epoch
unconsciously presuppose" continued their authoritative hold.
Now if, as Part II of this book is seeking to show, the Cappadocians transmitted, as part of their doctrinal patrimony to the
inheritors of Nicene orthodoxy during the following millennium
and more, some "fundamental assumptions" that were rooted in
natural theology, at least two far-reaching implications appear to
follow, one chiefly historiographical and the other primarily
philosophical-theological. The implication for what Georges
Florovsky called "the predicament of the Christian historian" is
that, to an extent that is sometimes ignored by those scholars
who concentrate exclusively on one region or on one period of
history, all students of the ideas and institutions of the Christian
church in any period need to obtain a significant command of
these early developments in order to understand their own fields
of scholarly concentration. The other implication is that the Copernican revolution in these presuppositions, which has been
precipitated in some measure by modern philosophy and modern
science, confronts the Christian thought of the nineteenth and
twentieth centuries, for the first time on any such scale since late
antiquity, with a natural theology in which such fundamental
assumptions as divine transcendence, human immortality, and
cosmic teleology may no longer be taken for granted, as they were
by the Cappadocians and by their successors in East and West for
more than a thousand years. The consequences of this change run
through most of post-Enlightenment theology and philosophy.
Thus, some such review of the Nicene orthodoxy articulated by
the Cappadocians would appear to be a presupposition for responsible thought in systematic or philosophical theology in the
present day.
186
Bernardi 1968,352-61
See p. 182
Gr.Naz.Or.27.3
(SC 250:76)
Bas.Het.3.3
(SC 26:202)
Bas.Ep.210.5
(Courtonne 2:195)
Jn i:i8;see pp.22425
Gr.Nyss.Or.catech.pt. 3
(Meridier 24)
Gr.Naz.Or.42.16
(PG 36:476)
Gr.Nyss.wM-3.6.26
(Jaeger 2:195)
Gr.Nyss.Gwf.13
(Jaeger 6:398)
N a t u r a l Theology as Presupposition
N a t u r a l Theology as Presupposition
Gr.Naz.Or.40.42
(PG 36:41720)
Bas.rtec.3.3
(SC 26:202)
Gr.Nyss.aK. 3.6.26
(Jaeger 2:195)
Gr.Nyss.Gmt. 13
(Jaeger 6:376)
Gr.Nyss.Qmf.15
(Jaeger 6:460)
Gr.Naz.Or.22.11
(SC 270:242)
See pp.263-64,252-53
Gt.Nyss.Or.catech.5.1
(Meridier 22)
Bas.Hex.3.3
(SC 26:202)
Lib.ap.Bas.Ep. 340
(Courronne 3:208)
187
the recognition that different presuppositions could lead to different dogmatic emphases, depending upon what was perceived to
be the primary danger. "Are you afraid to speak of 'begetting
[gennesis]' within the Godhead, lest you attribute anything like
passion to the God of apatbeia?" Gregory of Nazianzus asked his
heretical opponents, continuing with this admission: "For my
part, what I am afraid of is speaking about 'creating' within the
Godhead, lest I destroy [the true doctrine of] God by the insult
and the untrue division, cutting the Son away from the Father or
cutting the ousia of the Spirit away from the Son." For despite
Basil's apparently clear and simple distinction between "the message of the church" and the thought of "those on the outside,"
the Cappadocian method of relating these two to each other, not
least in his own version of what his brother Gregory called "the
orthodox mode of thought," was one not of excluding the second
in the name of the first but of comprehending both within the
orthodox system. Gregory of Nyssa identified "two ways of joining man to God," true doctrine and clear reasoning, both of
which came from God and each of which needed the other to be
complete. As he urged later in the commentary, the use of reason
as a path to knowledge could serve to confirm the truth of faith.
In short, as Gregory of Nazianzus put it, "Some truths are knowable by faith alone [tina men tei pistei doteon monei], some also
by reasoning [tina de kai tois logismois]." For example, Greeks
on the basis of their innate ideas and Jews on the basis of their
Bible would accept the doctrines of the divine Logos and of the
Spirit of God, but both would "equally reject the economy by
which the divine Logos became man," because that depended on
the authority of faith alone.
Although such statements as Basil's, about "leaving the vanity
of outsiders to those on the outside, and returning to the message
of the church" could give the impression that the truth of the
gospel made any further attention to philosophy and natural
theology unnecessary, he was obliged to hearand, in his own
way, to confirm by his theological practicethe reminder that
came to him in the portentous warning of a leading spokesman
for Hellenism, his pagan colleague (and perhaps his teacher)
Libaniusof Antioch: "Keep to the books [of the Bible], which you
say are inferior in style, though better in sense. No one is stopping
you. But of the principles that were ever mine, and that once were
yours, the roots both remain and will remain, as long as you exist.
Though you water them ever so little, no length of time will ever
completely destroy them." In a familiar metaphor, Gregory of
N a t u r a l T h e o l o g y as Presupposition
Ex 12:3536
Gr.Nyss. V.M05.2
(Jaeger 7 -I:68)
Gr.Nyss. V.Mos.z
(Jaeger 7 -I:68)
Gr.Nyss. V.Mos.z
(Jaeger 7 - I : 3 7 )
Gr.Nyss.MM.I.186
(Jaeger 1:81)
Lenz 1925,105 19
Gr.Nyss.4poZ/.
(Jaeger 3-I:i88)
Gr.Nyss.EwM.2-50
(Jaeger 1:240)
Nyssa justified such a use of Hellenism on the basis of the command of God to the Israelites at the Exodus to take with them the
gold of the Egyptians as reparations. In the same way, those who
had received and achieved "the life of freedom through arete" in
the church could appropriate "the riches of Classical paideusis"
that previously had belonged to the Greeks, including "ethics,
natural science, geometry, astronomy, and logic." He endorsed,
therefore, the combination of profane learning and sacred learning. He coordinatedand in this orderthree sources of knowledge: "those who philosophized outside the faith [ton exo tes
pisteos pephilosophekonton]"; "the inspired sayings [tais theopneustasi phonais]" of Scripture; and "the common apprehension
of mankind [tais koinais ennoiais]." In keeping with that principle of coordination, his brother Basil also linked Plato's Timaeus
and the Book of Genesis to provide "clear proofs of the onlybegotten one [monogenes]," as this "only-begotten one [monogenes]" had been spoken of in Timaeus explicitly and only implicitly in Genesis (rather than the other way around, as might
have been supposed). Indeed, when Gregory of Nazianzus discussed "to peri theou philosophein," he not only laid claim to it
as an activity that was permissible for believers but went so far as
to insist: "It is permitted only to those who have been examined,
and are past masters in meditation, and have been previously
purified, or at least are in the process of being purified."
As the coupling of the two cases in their polemics suggested,
the Cappadocians' consideration of the Christian case against
Greek philosophy had much in common with their presentation
of the orthodox case against heresy. That was particularly true of
their use of natural theology as presupposition. There were also,
of course, presuppositions in their arguments against heresy, for
example against Apollinaris on the humanity of Christ, that were
specifically and exclusively Christian. Thus Gregory of Nyssa,
writing against Eunomius, declared: "The tenet which has been
held in common [dogma koinon] by all who have received the
word of our religion is that all hope of salvation should be placed
in Christ, it being impossible for anyone to be found among the
righteous unless faith in Christ supplies what is desired." Here he
would seem to have been attributing this "dogma" not alone to
himself and his orthodox colleagues, but even to the heretics he
was attacking. The difference, he seemed to be arguing, was that
the orthodox drew the correct trinitarian and christological conclusions from this shared Christian presupposition while the heretics did not. At other points in the polemic against Eunomius,
N a t u r a l Theology as Presupposition
Gr.Nyss.fo<H.3.3.38
(Jaeger 2:120-21)
Gr.Nyss.Re/".7
(Jaeger 2:315)
Graef 1963-65,1:62-68
Mai 3:6
Bas.Ep.262.12
(Courtonne 3:119'>-20)
Gr.NaZ.Or.39.13
(PG 36t348-49)
189
190
PS 76:11
Gr.Nyss.V.Mos.i
(Jaeger 7-1:41)
Gr.Nyss.Infant.
(Jaeger 3-11:67-79)
Schoemann 1943,178
82.; Dorrie et al. 1976,
79-82.
Malunowiczowna
!975,35-45;
Gregg 1975,219-64
Bas.Ep.5
(Courtonne 1:16-18)
Gr.Nyss./w^inf.
(Jaeger 3 - I I : 8 i )
Gr.Nyss. Infant.
(Jaeger 3 -H:86)
N a t u r a l Theology as Presupposition
Seepp.179-80
''
N
_
(Jaeger 6:381)
KT
. .
Gr.Nyss.Anim.res.
(PG 46:64)
Gr.Nyss. V.Mos.
:; tgTer 7~
Gr.Nyss.Bm.3.1.93
(Jaeger 2:35)
Heb 4:15
191
'
192.
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:49)
Gr.Naz.Or.31.18
(SC 250:330-31)
See pp.174-75
Gr.Naz.Or.28.14
(SC 250:128);
Bas.Ep.8.2
(Courtonne 1:24)
Ras.Spir.i.z
(SC 17:254)
Gr.Nyss.EMtt.1.21719
(Jaeger 1:90)
N a t u r a l Theology as Presupposition
it might have seemed to follow that the most reliable index to the
content of the "image" in the nature of man was the humanity of
Christ, and that therefore it was possible to read off from the
humanity of the incarnate Logos what had been meant by the
original "image of God"; but that was not in fact the exclusive
method that the Cappadocians followed in their anthropology,
for they combined it with other presuppositions about the definition of essential humanity.
Yet, the important consideration historically is not how such
presuppositions might conceivably have functioned in the dogmatics of the Cappadocians, but how in fact they did function
there. All four were agreed that sound theology was impossible
without careful attention to establishing first principles and
moving from these to valid conclusions. "We are not entitled to
the license of affirming what we please," Macrina declared; and
she attacked her opponents for positing a "fundamental conception [hyponoia]" that could not "stand secure on every side."
Gregory of Nazianzus denounced theological faddishness, which
he described as "following the temper of the times, at one time
being of one mind and ot another at another time, and thinking
unsoundly in the highest matters." The sound alternative to such
a trend was to specify presuppositions and then to move from
these to correct conclusions. Invoking the concept of stoicheia,
which he and the other Cappadocians sometimes used as a technical scientific term for the four basic elements of earth, air, fire,
and water, Basil also used it for the relation of the "elements" in
the sense of the ABCS and presuppositions of a craft to the achievement of a mature faith and understanding, thus for what in English would be called "elementary" as well as for what would be
called "elemental." As the most profound and speculative of
them all, Gregory of Nyssa was also the most explicit about the
place of presuppositions in a theological system. Criticizing Eunomius "for not using the recognized methods for establishing
his views," he asserted this methodological axiom: "All such
arguing must start from plain and well-known truths, to compel
belief through itself in truths that are still doubtful; and none of
these latter can be grasped without the guidance of what is obvious leading us towards the unknown. If, on the other hand, that
which is adopted to start with for the illustration of this unknown
is at variance with universal belief, it will be a long time before the
unknown will receive any illumination from it." Toward the end
of the treatise against Eunomius, he reaffirmed this axiom about
first principles, as "demanding from one's opponents to begin by
N a t u r a l Theology as Presupposition
Gr.Nyss.EKW.3.2.90
(Jaeger 2:81)
Gr.Nyss.EMtt.3-2.97
(Jaeger 2:84)
Gr.Nyss.EMtt.2.56
(Jaeger 1:242)
Gr.Nyss.Mazed.
(Jaeger 3-1:90)
Rebecchi 1943,322-25
Gr.Nyss.H0m.0pif.z8
(PG 44:232)
Gr.Nyss..3.2.58
(Jaeger 2:71-72)
Gr.Naz.Or.31.18
[SC 250:30810)
Gr.Nyss.Ewtt.2.83
(Jaeger 1:251)
Bas.Sp<>.28.70
(SC 17:496)
i?3
194
Gr.Nyss.EwM.1.591
(Jaeger 1:196)
Acts 2:36
Gr.Nyss..3.4.62
(Jaeger 1:158)
Gr.Nyss.Canr.13
(Jaeger 6:376)
Gr.Nyss. V.Mos. 2
(Jaeger 7-1:44)
Gr.Nyss. Beat. 5
(PG 44:1249)
Bas.Leg.lib.gent.i
(Wilson 20)
N a t u r a l Theology as Presupposition
N a t u r a l Theology as Presupposition
Gr.Nyss.EwK.3.1.6
(Jaeger 2:5)
Bas.Ep.210.5
(Courtonne 2:195)
Gr.Naz.Or.28.6
(5C 250:11012)
See pp.200-214
Gr.Nyss.EKn.3.7.34
(Jaeger 2:227)
Gr.Nyss.Or.carec^.15
(Meridier 78-82)
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:72)
Bas.Sp(V.9.22
(SC 17:322)
195
i<?6
Bas.Spmi6.4
(SC 17:386)
Gr.Nyss.Ewtt. 1.315
(Jaeger 1:120)
Gr.Naz.Or.z9. 2
(SC 250:224)
Eun.ap.Bas.EwM. 1.5
(50299:170)
Eun.ap.Gr.Nyss.Ewtt.
3.7.26 (Jaeger 2:224)
Gr.Naz.Or.29.1617
(SC 250:212)
Gr.Nyss.EHM. 1.530
(Jaeger 1:179)
Bas.fip.235.1
(Courtonne 3:44 [var.])
See pp.263-79
Gr.Nyss.Or.ctf(ecb.20.i
(Meridier 98)
Asmus 1894,325
See pp.13651
Gr.Nyss.V.Mos.2
(Jaeger 7-1:43)
Jaeger 1948,117-18
Gr.Nyss.Apoll.
(Jaeger 3-L198)
N a t u r a l Theology as Presupposition
N a t u r a l Theology as Presupposition
Gr.Nyss.Tres dii
{Jaeger 3-1:37)
Bas.Ep.276
(Courtonne 3:148)
Arist.EN.iii5a-ni9b;
nz9a-ii38b
See p. 141
See pp.29293
Gr.Nyss.H0m.0pif.16
(PG 44:181)
See pp.1819
Mortley 1986,2:15
Eun.ap.Gr.Nyss.wra.
1.606 (Jaeger 1:201)
Gr.Naz.p.202
(PG 37:333)
Gr.Nyss. Maced.
(Jaeger 3-1:104)
Seepp.zoo-zi4
197
198
Gr.Nyss.Hom.opif.zi
(PG 44:101)
Gr.Nyss./n/awi.
(Jaeger 3-11:76-77)
Gr.Nyss. Maced.
(Jaeger 3-1:90-91 [cj])
Gr.Nyss. Eun. 1.23132
(Jaeger 1:94-95)
Bas.Ep.38.3
(Courtonne 1:83)
Gr.Nyss. Or.dom. 2
(PG 44:1140)
Gr.Nyss. Eun.i. 208
(Jaeger 1:87)
Gr.Naz.Ep.101
(PG 37:189)
Gr.Nyss.Hom.opif.pr.
(PG 44:128)
See pp.2239
N a t u r a l Theology as Presupposition
echei]," they also had to accept the principle that evil, which was
mutable, was less powerful than good, which participated in the
very immutability of God.
That presupposition about good and evil was not only epistemological, however, but primarily ontological, as were others
that the Cappadocians invoked in their specifically dogmatic and
polemical writings; for whether pagan or heretical or orthodox,
everyone accepted the presupposition of "a universe linked to one
first cause, with nothing in it owing its existence to itself." In the
confession of the divine nature of the Holy Spirit, Gregory of
Nyssa declared, it was impossible to "recognize any distinctions
suggested either by scriptural teachings or by common sense
[oute ek tes ton graphon didaskalias oute ek ton koinon ennoion]," because it was the consensus of both that the divine
nature was simple and undivided. Therefore he could assert the
proposition, as something that everyone knew: "To be exact,
simplicity in the case of the Holy Trinity admits of no degree."
Similarly, in a letter to him his brother Basil could recommend,
for the understanding of the trinitarian terms ousia as referring to
what was shared and hypostasis as referring to what was particular in the Godhead, that he "transfer to the divine dogmas [epi
ton theion dogmaton] the same standard of difference recognized
in the case both of ousia and of hypostasis in human affairs."
Both from Scripture and "from its own reasonings [dia te tes
theias graphes kai ton oikeion logismon]," the human mind
could learn that the divine nature, whatever it may have been in
itself, was "absolute goodness, holiness, and joy, power, glory,
and purity, an eternity always absolutely the same." Hence, no
one would regard the being of God as something "heterogeneous
and composite." Nor was it solely with regard to the divine
nature, but also with regard to human nature, that the Cappadocians felt entitled to invoke such presuppositions. Not only orthodox Christians but "everyone with a spark of sense" were
obliged to acknowledge "the flesh as less precious than the soul,"
according to Gregory of Nazianzus. The ground for such an
assertion was formulated in the introduction to the treatise On
the Making of Man by Gregory of Nyssa, when he identified not
only Scripture but also reason as a valid source for understanding
human nature.
It was, then, with such presuppositions, and with such presuppositions about presuppositions, that the Cappadocians faced
not only the task of apologetics toward Classical culture but the
task of dogmatics toward the church, as that task was described
Cr.Nyss.Hom.opif.pr.
(PG 44:118)
199
CHAPTER
13
Bas.spir.18.46
(SC 17:408)
Bas.ffex.2.2
(SC 26:148)
See pp.41-42,50
(SC 26:494)
200
T h e Lexicon of Transcendence
Gr.Nyss.Eww. i .426-29
(Jaeger 1:150-51)
Gr.Naz.Or.21.i
(SC 270:112)
Bas.Ep.233.2
(Courtonne 3:40)
ap.Gr.Nyss.wra.2.64
(Jaeger 1:244)
ap.Gr.Nyss.Efm. 3.2.8
(Jaeger 2:54)
Bas.Ep.23 3.2
(Courtonne 3:40)
Lewy 1929,13237
2 Cor 12:110
N a t u r a l Theology as Presupposition
Gr.Nyss.Cant.5
(Jaeger 6:138)
Gr.Nyss.iiMM.z.14244
(Jaeger 1:26667)
Muhlenberg 1966,14247
Gr.Nyss. Virg. 10
(Jaeger 8-1:291)
Gr.Nyss. V.Mos.2
(Jaeger 7 - I : 8 6 - 8 7 )
Gr.Nyss.CaHt.13
(Jaeger 6:381)
Plantinga 1986,352
Bas.Spi'r.9.22
(SC 17:322)
See pp.2425,241
T h e Lexicon of Transcendence
Gr.Nyss.Maced.
(Jaeger 3-1:96)
Gr.Nyss.Apoll.
(Jaeger 31:22829)
Gf.Nyss.Euw. 1.169
(Jaeger 1:77)
Gr.Nyss.EKn.1.418
0aeger 1:148)
Gr.Nyss.Eaw.L59
(Jaeger 1:42)
Eun.ap.Gr.Nyss.EHW.
3.7.1 (Jaeger 2:215)
Gr.Nyss.K. 2.596
(Jaeger 1:400)
Gr.Nyss.Maced.
(Jaeger 3-1:91)
See pp.259-62
203
2.Q4
Gr.Nyss.GjKf.13
(Jaeger 6:381)
E p h 2:2122
Gr.Nyss.Gmti5
(Jaeger 6:438)
See pp.31617
See pp.295,31718
Gr.Nyss.Vzrg.io
(Jaeger 81:290)
Gr.Naz.Or.29.11
(SC 2 5 0 : 2 0 0 )
Jn 2 1 : 2 5
Gr.Nyss.Ewtt.2.11924
(Jaeger 1:26062)
Gr.Naz.Or.28.19
{SC 250:13840)
Ps 8 : 2 - 3
Gr.Naz.Or.28.3
(SC 2 5 0 : 1 0 6 )
Gr.Nyss.G/Mf.8
(Jaeger 6:247)
M t 5:8
Gr.Nyss.Beat.6
(PG 44:1265)
Jn 1:18
1 T m 6:16
N a t u r a l T h e o l o g y as P r e s u p p o s i t i o n
T h e Lexicon of Transcendence
Ex 33:2.0
Gr.Nyss.Beat.6
(PG 44:1163)
Bas.n.i.i6
(SC 305:64)
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:40)
Gr.Nyss.Maced.
(Jaeger 3-1:99)
Gr.Nyss.&rfK.z. 581-82
(Jaeger 1:396)
Gr.Nyss.Beat.3
(PG 44:1225)
Gr.Naz.Or.37.4
(SC 318:278)
205
slippery, steep rock that affords no basis for our thoughts, which
the teaching of Moses, too, declares to be so inaccessible that our
mind can nowhere approach God. For this explicit denial takes
away all possibility of apprehending God, 'No mortal man may
see me and live.'" Both the exegetical and the conceptual difficulties demonstrated that apophatic theology, far from being
merely an apologetic or heuristic or rhetorical device or even only
a presupposition of natural theology among other such presuppositions, had to provide the lexicon for a distinctive and comprehensive theological method, above all in church dogmatics:
"Following the theologies that have been handed down to us by
the Holy Spirit" meant to acknowledge, by means of alpha privatives, that the ways of God were "characterized by apatbeia,
indivisibility, inseparability, and timelessness."
Macrina, who is being dubbed here the Fourth Cappadocian,
described this general method as follows: "In the very act of
saying that a thing is 'not so and so,' we by implication interpret
the very nature of the thing in question." Elaborating on this
method, her brother Gregory spoke of a "duty to expel the low,
human way of thinking, by means of the more transcendent ideas
[tais hypseloterais ton ennoion], and to make a calculation more
worthy of the transcendence [tou hypsous] of the objects in question." Elsewhere, too, he identified it as "a sacred duty to use
concerning God names privative of the things abhorrent to the
divine nature." It was characteristic of these privative titles that
"the meaning inherent in each" was intended "to inform us only
of the privation of the obvious data of our sense experience, but
not to interpret the actual nature" of what had been "removed
from these abhorrent conditions." The titles answered the question, "What is the Deity not?" while leaving undisclosed the
answer to the next question, "What is that further thing, which is
not these things, in its own ousiaV And even those titles that
were positive in form and language, "indicating some position or
some state," had to be interpreted in such a way as "not to afford
an indication of the divine nature itself, but only the results of our
reverent speculations about it," which had to be apophatic.
The fundamental problem was: How to name the invisible, or
describe the nonmaterial, or show what could not be seen, or
comprehend what had neither size nor quantity, neither quality
nor form, what was neither in space nor in time, eluding all
limitation and every form of definition? And the lexicon for handling the problem still consisted of such apparently catapbatic
terms, since they were the only ones available, but it required
zo6
Gr.Nyss.Ewn. 1.630
(Jaeger 1:107-8)
Dix 1953,79
Gr.Naz.Or.30.4
(SC 250:230-32.)
Mt 2z:44;Mk 12:36;
Lk 2o:42;Acts 2:34;
Heb 1:13
Ps 109:1
Bas.Spm6.15
(SC 17:292)
Bar 3:3
Gr.Nyss.V.Mos.2
(Jaeger 7-1:111)
Gr.Naz.Or.28.18- 19
(SC 250:13640)
Ex 13:21
Gr.Nyss.V.Mos.i
(Jaeger 7-1:14)
Prestige 1933,260
Lampe 310n
Gr.Nyss.EMM.3.2.4
(Jaeger 2:53)
Gr.Nyss.EttM.3.6.3637
(Jaeger 2:198-99)
N a t u r a l Theology as Presupposition
T h e Lexicon of Transcendence
Gr.Nyss.Ewn.3.1.78-79
(Jaeger 1:31)
Gr.Nyss. Wrg. 2
(Jaeger 8-1:253)
Gr.Nyss.M.3.6.15
2:191)
Gr.Naz.O.38.7
(PG 36:317)
Gr.Nyss.M.2.i97
(Jaeger 1:282)
Gr.Nyss.w.2.23435
(Jaeger 1:294)
Gr.Nyss. Or.catech. 3.1
(Meridier 18)
Gr.Nyss. Cant.13
(Jaeger 6:383)
Gr.Nyss. Eun. 1.541
(Jaeger 1:183)
Bas.Sp/r.1.2
(SC 17:252)
Gr.Nyss.n. 1.620-23
(Jaeger 1:205-6)
Gr.Nyss.a. 1.300-301
(Jaeger 1:115)
Lenz 1925,51-55
xoy
zo8
Gr.Nyss. Trin.
(Jaeger 3 - I : I O - I I )
See pp.263-79
Bas.Ep.234.1
(Courtonne 3:42.)
Bas.Ep.5.2
(Courtonne 1:1718)
Dt 32:39
Gr.Nyss. Cant.iz
(Jaeger 6:362)
Gr.Nyss. Eun. 2.515
(Jaeger 1:377)
Balas 1966,12140
Gr.Nyss.Trin.
(Jaeger 3-1:8)
Gr.Nyss.EWH.2.21112
(Jaeger 1:28687)
Gr.Nyss. Eun. 1.597
(Jaeger 1:198)
Bas.Ep.234.1
(Courtonne 3:42)
Gr.Nyss. Eun. 1.37375
(Jaeger 1:137)
Gr.Naz.Or.28.9
(SC 250:11620)
Gr.Naz.Or.42.18
(PG 36:480)
Gr.Nyss.Ref. 3435
(Jaeger 2:325-26)
N a t u r a l Theology as Presupposition
T h e Lexicon of Transcendence
Gr.Nyss.Ewtt.3-7.51
(Jaeger 2:233)
Gr.Nyss.jEwn. 1.592
(Jaeger 1:196-97)
Mateo-Seco-Bastero
1988,30320
Danielou 1964,14763
Florovsky 10:211
Burrell 1991,2034
Bas.Eww.i.io
{SC 299:206)
Gr.Nyss.Tres dii
(Jaeger 3-1:42-43)
Gr.Nyss. Trin.
(Jaeger 3-1:14)
Gr.Nyss. V.Mos.2
(Jaeger 7-1:92)
Bas.Ewtt.i.io
[SC 299:204)
Z09
N a t u r a l T h e o l o g y as Presupposition
Gr.Nyss.EMM.3.5.42-43
(Jaeger 2:175-76);
Gr.Naz.Or.28.II
(SC 250:122)
Gr.Nyss.Bear.4
(PG 44:1241)
Gr.Nyss.Eww.2.14445
(Jaeger 1:267)
Gr.Nyss.Eww. 2.3 5 2-5 3
(Jaeger 1:329)
Lenz 1925,51-55
Bas.Ep.5.2
(Courtonne 1:1718);
Gr.Nyss.CaMr.12
(Jaeger 6:362)
Balas 1966,10815
Gr.Nyss.EMM.2.149
(Jaeger 1:268)
Gr.Nyss.EMH. 2.29 8
(Jaeger 1:314)
Gr.Nyss.Tres dii
(Jaeger 3-1:52-53)
Bas.Sp*V.i.2
(SC 17:252)
lren.Haer.4.10.1
(Harvey 2:17273)
Jgs 13:18
Gr.Nyss.Eww. 3.6.4
(Jaeger 2:187)
Gr.Nyss. Cant. 1
(Jaeger 6:37)
Gr.Naz.O.2.86
(SC 247:202)
names for God; but it was essential that these names be appropriate, which meant above all that they point beyond themselves to
the mystery of the incomprehensible nature of God.
Precisely because no one name could be adequate, there
turned out to be "innumerable" names for God, each with some
special but apopbatic implication. Each of these diverse appellations "by some distinctive touch" added something of its own, so
as to make it possible "by a variety of nomenclature to gain some
glimmerings " of the divine mystery. The source of this diversity of
divine names was traced by Gregory of Nyssa, speaking in defense of Basil, to the diverse "actions [energeiai]" of God, each of
which found expression in some distinctive title. So diverse were
these actions that to the limited human perspective they seemed
utterly contradictory. Therefore, Gregory formulated the lexicographical rule: "God is not an expression, neither does the
ousia of God consist in voice or utterance, but the divine nature is
of itself what also it is believed to be. Nevertheless it is named, by
those who call upon God, not what it is essentially (for the nature
of God, who alone is being, is ineffable), but it receives its appellations from what are believed to be its operations in regard to our
life." All such terms had their special fitness, because each variety
of the divine beneficence took shape "in the mould of a name."
Yet none of these diverse appellations could be thought of as
limiting God in any way. Nor instead was the lack of cataphatic
signification in such names to be taken as leading to a counsel of
despair that would conclude that because they all meant nothing
they all meant the same thing. For this sort of conclusion could
produce indifference and inattention. But the lexicon of transcendence implied the very opposite, the obligation to look in detail at
every name for God in order to discover what it contributed, not
indeed to a knowledge of the divine ousia as such, but to the
knowledge of these multifarious operations. When, therefore, the
"angel of the Lord" in the Old Testament (whom Christian exegesis had long taken as a theophany of the preexistent and preincarnate Logos), in response to the question, "What is your
name?" replied, "Wonderful [thaumaston]," this was not the
name of God in essence, but a reference to "the wonder arising
unspeakably in our hearts concerning it." From this sense of
wonder arose the "theological names" for God, such adjectives
as "wise, powerful, good, holy, blessed, and eternal," and such
nouns as "Judge and Savior."
The same was true of the other revelations of "the power of the
name" of God or of Christ in the Scriptures. Each exegetical
Mt 6:9
Gr.Nyss.Or.iiom.3
(PG 44:1153-56)
Gr.Naz.Or.30.17
(SC 250:26062.);
Bas.SpjV.18.44
(SC 17:404)
See pp.221-24
Bas.Spir.18.44
[SC 17:402)
Pelikan 197189,
1:25666
Murray 1964,5
2 Cor 13:14
Luislampe 1981,3549
Bas.Sp1V.25.59
(SC 17:458-60)
Bas.sp/V.29.75
(SC 17:516)
encounter with the very term "name," for example in the first
petition of the Lord's Prayer, became an occasion for repeating
these warnings. Quite apart from the pious Jewish practice of
treating the unutterable Hebrew divine name in a special way, for
example by pronouncing it as "Lord," a practice with which the
Cappadocians seem to have had at least some acquaintance despite their acknowledged ignorance of the Hebrew tongue, their
Bible contained nearly a thousand references, one hundred or so
in the Book of Psalms alone, to the term "name" (the Greek
"onoma" and cognates), as well as several thousand references to
the term "Lord [kyrios]," whether as a rendering of the tetragrammaton or in its own right as a divine name in the Septuagint,
then also in the New Testament for Jesus Christ as Lord. Among
these thousands of passages, at least three, two in the New Testament and one in the Old Testament, certainly appeared to be
revelations of the divine ousia through a divine name if anything
was, but these instead became, at the hands of the Cappadocians,
proof texts for the principle of apophasis as the language of transcendence: "the formula of the Father and the Son and the Holy
Spirit" in Matthew 28:1920, as "delivered by the Lord himself"; the key statement of "preexistence, kenosis, and exaltation" in Philippians 2:6 11; and the "towering text" of the theophany of the divine name to Moses in Exodus 3:14. These were
three biblical oracles of such massive importance as to merit
special attention.
Together with the Pauline benediction, "The grace of the Lord
Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy
Spirit, be with you all," which was written down earlier but
presumably spoken later, the baptismal formula from the Gospel
of Matthew, "in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy
Spirit," constituted the most explicit biblical identification of all
three hypostases of the Trinity; and the two passages were therefore seen to be closely related. As such an identification, the
baptismal formula was a keystone of trinitarian orthodoxy, so
that Basil, for example, gave it priority in his list of proofs for the
Nicene doctrine of the Trinity. It had the additional advantage of
containing an explicit reference to the concept of "the name."
Closer inspection of the formula, however, showed it to be a
particularly striking piece of evidence for the "unnameability of
the name" of God; for after seeming to promise a disclosure of
the name, Christ in fact "did not add the actual term of signification that 'the name' indicates." Because the uncreated nature of
God transcended "all signification of names," this baptismal
Gr.Nyss.Re/. 14 15
(Jaeger 1:318)
,
(Jaeger 2:365)
GN E
68(Jaeger 1:190-91)
Gr N
Gr.Nyss.Re/. 10
jaeger 2^31
Gr.Nyss.CHM. 1.554
(jaeger 1:186)
, .
N,
Gr.Nyss.Re/16-17
(Jaeger 2:318-19)
n
Phil 2:9-11
(Jaeger 2:279)
G N
N
(sc 318:276-80)
T h e Lexicon of Transcendence
Gr.Nyss.Apoll.
(Jaeger 3 - I : I 6 I )
Gr.Nyss.Eww. 1.683
(Jaeger 1:222)
Gr.Nyss.wK.3.8.ioii
(Jaeger 1:242)
Gr.Nyss.istttt.3.6.32
(Jaeger 2:197)
Wis 13:5
Gr.Nyss..2.i54
(Jaeger 1:270)
Gr.Nyss.Eun. 3.9.41
(Jaeger 1:279)
Jgs 13:18
Gr.Nyss.w.3.6.4
(Jaeger 2:187)
Ex 3:14
Gottwald 1906,22-23
Gr.Naz.Or.30.18
(SC 250:264)
Ex 3:2
Gr.Nyss.EMH.3.6.3
(Jaeger 2:186)
Is 41:4
Is 43:10
Gr.Naz.Or.31.23
(SC 250:31820)
Gr.Nyss.EwM. 3.5.57-60
(Jaeger 2:18082)
ZI
biguously, to "all names" whatever, including spiritual and metaphysical ones "in heaven, on earth, and in the depths," no less
than it did to such physical names. There was, then, "only one
name for representing the proper nature [of God], the single
'name of being above all names [to onoma to hyper pan o n o m a ] . ' "
That led to the oxymoron: "The one who is above all names has
for us many names." Each of these names for one who was also
"beyond all signification [hyper pasan semasian]" pointed to the
true God, but it did so "analogically." Proof for this came from
the statement of the Book of Wisdom: "The greatness and beauty
of created things analogically [analogos] give us an idea of their
Creator." And "the name above all names," which was therefore
unnameable, was not to be regarded as one name among others,
not even as the highest of these, but as an apophatic reference to
the confession, "The one who verily 'is' is above all names."
That reference to "the one who verily 'is'" was, at least in part,
an echo of the most profound and sublime of all biblical references to a "name" for God. It came, as did the identification of
the name of God as "Wonderful [thaumaston]," in response to an
inquiry, this time from Moses before the burning bush, about
what the divine name was: "God said to Moses, 'I am the one
who is [Ego eimi ho o n ] . ' " On the basis of this text, Gregory of
Nazianzus, having identified "God [theos]" and "the one who is
[ho o n ] " as the two "special names of God's essence," then went
on to show that even "theos" was still in fact a name of relationship rather than a name of essence. As for "the one who is,"
however, this not only carried the authority of the encounter of
Moses with the divine but was "the more strictly appropriate" on
its own merits. For this title made it the identifiable mark of "the
truly divine" to possess "eternity and infinity in respect to being,
making everything contemplated therein always the same, neither growing nor being consumed," a divine quality symbolized
by the burning bush, which was "on fire but was not being burnt
up." Throughout the Bible, the use of the verb "to be" for God
as in such passages from Isaiah as "I God, the first and to all
futurity, I am [ego theos protos, kai eis ta eperchomena ego
eimi]," and "I am: before me there was no other god, and after
me there shall be none [ego eimi, emprosthen mou ouk egeneto
alios theos, kai met' eme ouk estai]"ascribed being in the fullest sense to God, and to God alone. The word "is," therefore, was
to be supplied with every divine attribute and "with every name
used concerning the divine nature." It followed that " 'being' in
214
Gr.Nyss.Eww. 3.8.32
(Jaeger 2:250-51)
.g
(Jaeger 2:188)
G N
KT .,
.
Gr.Nyss.cra.3.5.59-60
(Jaeger 2:181-82)
_ F
(sc 299:218)
the true sense of that word [to alethos einai]" was "the special
distinction of Godhead."
But in the Cappadocian lexicon of transcendence this equation of God with being, like every other divine name, could be
rescued from grave misunderstanding only by invoking apophatic theology. For if the word from the burning bush meant,
"We know nothing else of God but this one thing, that God is,"
the "we know" in that declaration had to be qualified by the
warning: "We do not by this negative predication understand the
subject, but are guided as to what we must not think concerning
' '
the subject." Thus the self-revelation of God did not in fact answer the request of Moses for a name, nor did it provide a disclosure of the transcendent ousia of God. That kind of exegetical
argumentation by the Cappadocians inevitably raised the question of whether this left any room for faith in a reliable divine
revelation, together with the question of how a divine being defined in such negative terms could at the same time serve as the
foundation for the Cappadocian doctrine of the relation between
the one divine ousia and the three divine hypostases in the Trinity.
CHAPTER
14
Bas.p.i25.i
(Courtonne 2:130)
Symb.Nic.
(Alberigo-Jedin 5)
Gr.Naz.Or.28.9
(SC 250:118)
215
216
zTmz:i3
Gr.Nyss. Maced.
(Jaeger 3-1:97)
Hebn:i
Macr.ap. Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:96)
Acts 17:23
Bas.Ep.52.3
(Courtonne 1:136)
Eun.ap.Gr.Nyss.Re/'.
n 6 - r 7 (Jaeger 2:36162)
Gr.Nyss. V.Mos. 1
(Jaeger 7-1:22)
Cr.Nyss.Beat.6
(PG 44:1264)
Gr.Nyss.Hex.
(PG 44:73)
Bas.Mor.8.3
(PG 31:713-16)
N a t u r a l Theology as Presupposition
Gr.Naz.Or.28.28
(^0250:164)
Gr.Naz.Or.29.2i
(SC 250:224)
Gr.Nyss.Anim.res.
{PG 46:108)
onl :
217
you." The path to truth was to admit: "Faith rather than reason
shall lead us, if that is, you have learned the feebleness of reason
. . . and have acquired enough knowledge of reason to recognize
things that surpass reason." Only then, he concluded, would the
philosopher "not be a wholly earthbound thinker, ignorant of
your very ignorance." But once he had put reason in its place,
Nazianzen could almost immediately go on in the very next oration to portray "faith as the fulfillment of our reasoning [he gar
pistis tou kath' hemas logou plerosis]." This possibility for reason was, however, defeated if someone abandoned "faith, to take
the power of reason as our shield." For when that happened,
reason would " give way in the face of the vastness of the realities,"
as indeed it had to, because "the organ of human understanding"
was so "frail." Paradoxically, therefore, the abandonment of
"smartness of argument" was the only trustworthy path to the
deliverance of reason. The doctrine of resurrection, for example,
was demonstrated by faith and by the authority of Scripture;
nevertheless Gregory of Nyssa urged, in requesting Macrina to
push her philosophical speculations further: "Since the weakness
of the human understanding is strengthened still further by any
arguments [logismois] that are intelligible to us, it would be well
not to leave this part of the subject without philosophical examination." Basil, too, cited the authority of "our faith" as "the
universal answer" to the question, "Whence is it that we are
Christians?" But if it was correct to confess, "Salvation is established through the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit," then
it was folly to "fling away that received 'pattern of teaching [typos
didachesl'" as the content of the trinitarian faith, which identi-
Bas..Sp*r.io.26
(SC 17:336)
Heb 11:1
..
..
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Gn i5:6;Rom 4:3
K.
Gr.Nyss.tWM. 2.9193
(Jaeger 1:253-54)
aufor,
enthe
r-
2l8
Prv 7:4
Gr.Naz.O.6.5
(PG 35:728)
Florovsky 4:131-35
Ath.Ar.2.18-12
(PG 16:184-93)
Prv 8:22.
Gr.Naz.Or.30.2
(SC 250:228)
Gr.Nyss.Apoll.
(Jaeger 3-I:i88)
Gr.Nyss.Gm.7
(Jaeger 6:202-3)
Gr.Nyss.Apoll.
(Jaeger 3-1:219)
Jn 1:1
Portmann 1954,109-24
Gr.Nyss.Ct2Kt8
(Jaeger 6:945)
Gn 1:3
Ps 103:24
Gr.Nyss.Hex.
(PG 44:73)
Prv 8:22
N a t u r a l Theology as Presupposition
1 Cor 1:24
Gr.Nyss. V.Mos. 2
(Jaeger 7-1:91)
Gr.Nyss. Cant. 1
(Jaeger 6:17)
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:145)
Bas.f1p.254.8
(Courtonne 3:82)
Gr.Nyss. Cant. 14
(Jaeger 6:417)
Gr.Nyss. Maced.
(Jaeger 3-1:97)
Gr.Nyss. Eun. 2.89
(Jaeger 1:252-53)
Gr.Nyss.EMM. 2.149
(Jaeger 1:268)
Gr.Nyss. Cant.5
(Jaeger 6:86)
2.19
22.o
Gr.Naz.Or.z8.28
(SC 250:164)
Gr.Naz.Or.29.21
(SC 250:224)
Bas.5pzr.21.52
(SC 17:438);
Gr.Naz.Or.28.9
(SC 250:116);
Gr.Nyss. Cawi. 15
(Jaeger 6:436)
2 Tm 3:16
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:49)
Gr.Nyss. V.Mos. z
(Jaeger 7-1:103)
N a t u r a l Theology as Presupposition
or to lay hold of the superior nature of the Most High," what was
needed was for "the divine power" to endow human nature with
what it was capable of receiving, by condescending to it in the
incarnation; in short, God "bestowed on us this helpful gift of
grace." And on the human side, the resolution of the contradiction lay in faith, which put the human reason in touch with
"things celestial" by teaching it "to recognize things that surpass
reason." That was what was meant by Nazianzen's axiomatic
definition of faith as "the fulfillment of our reasoning." Faith,
then, was not simply one in a series of the several ways of knowing, but it was the most radically apophatic of such ways, which
granted "certainty about nonapparent reality" by recognizing
the enormous limitations under which all human knowledge was
obliged to labor. That was also what Nyssen meant by his statement quoted earlier, that for faith, the divine had its being precisely there where thought did not reach. In that way faith accomplished what reason and knowledge purported to accomplish
and could not, but it did so by its reverent acceptance both of
divine transcendence and of human finitude.
Those radically apophatic definitions of faith, truth, and the
grace of revelation also determined the place occupied in the
Cappadocian system by the doctrine of Scripture. As orthodox
Christian theologians, Basil and the two Gregorys were all unambiguously certain of its divine inspiration and of its authority,
quoting and affirming the language of the apostle Paul about
"divinely inspired [theOpneustos] Scripture," and applying it to
the New Testament no less than to the Old Testament, about
which it had been specifically spoken. Macrina was speaking in
the name also of the other three when she said: "We make the
Holy Scriptures the rule and the measure of every tenet; we necessarily fix our eyes upon that, and approve only that which may be
made to harmonize with the intention of those writings." The
historical descriptions and prophecies of the Old Testament,
therefore, even such seemingly trivial ones as those that prescribed the vestments of the Levitical priesthood, were to be read
as speaking authoritatively "concerning the things happening
now, in our own time." All of this was important as a part of their
exposition of the church's revealed teachings, and it would bulk
large as prolegomenon in any attempt to construct their system of
church dogmatics. But there was also a role for natural theology
and for the understanding of faith as the fulfillment of reason
within their doctrine of Scripture, and it became the most explicit
and the most distinctive at several crucial points: in prescribing
Metzger 1975,340-491
Harl 1971,12743
Amand de Mendieta
1965
Field i875,i:lii-lvii
Bas.Hex.4.5
(SC 26:264)
Kristeller 1961,79
Gr.Nyss. Or.dom. 5
(PG 44:1188)
Bas.Spir.1.2
(SC 17:252)
221
Is 9:5
Gr.Nyss.M.3.9-33
(Jaeger 2:276)
See pp.2021
Bas.E^.339
(Courtonne 3:207)
Ps 146:4
Eun.ap.Gr.Nyss.Eww.
2-437 (Jaeger 1:354)
Jb9:9
Is 13:10
Gr.Nyss.EKH.2.437
(Jaeger 1:354)
Gr.Nyss.CtfKt.14
(Jaeger 6:410)
Ex 12:11
Gr.Naz.Or.45.10
(PG 36:636-37)
Gn 27:36
Gr.Nyss.Etttt.2.286
(Jaeger 1:310)
Sgi:6
Gr.Nyss.Ctf.2
(Jaeger 6:53-54)
Gr.Nyss.Hex.
(PG 44:80)
Gr.Nyss.Canr. 13
(Jaeger 6:390)
Gn 1:1
Gr.Nyss.EMB. 2.406
(Jaeger 1:344)
Gr.Nyss.V/rg.4
(Jaeger 8-1:271)
Smalley 1964,32955
Gt.Nyss.Or.catech.4.1
(Meridier 20)
Is 7:14
Mt 1:23
22.3
mological origin of "pascha," the name for Passover in the Septuagint, as in the passage, "It is a Passover to the Lord [pascha
estin kurioi]," which then went on to become the Greek Christian name for Easter. The name Jacob meant "supplanter," as
Esau indicated when he said that Jacob "supplanted me" ("epterniken me," as the Septuagint had it); Gregory of Nyssa explained
the Hebrew etymology of the name, being careful, however, to
avoid the impression that this information came from his own
linguistic erudition, but making clear that he got this from "the
learned in such matters." Therefore, the Cappadocians could
occasionally take it upon themselves to criticize the Septuagint
translation as an unsatisfactory rendering of the Hebrew original.
One method they could sometimes invoke to cope with this
quandary, of knowing that the Greek version was wrong but
being unable to correct it themselves on the basis of the original
Hebrew, was to have recourse to other Greek translations from
the second century of the Christian era, those of Symmachus
(who was probably a Jewish proselyte), of Theodotion, and of
Aquila (who was said to have been a convert from paganism to
Christianity, and subsequently from Christianity to Judaism), as
a way of amplifying or correcting the Septuagint version. But for
some Hebrew terms there simply was no adequate Greek word in
any of these translations. Thus "ouranos" was the Greek word
for "heaven," no less in the Greek Christian Scripturesfor example, in the very first verse of the Biblethan in Classical usage; but it was important to be reminded that this was not what
"the [original] Hebrew called it." "Darkness [skotos]," too, had
in Hebrew a name different from that Greek word. This display of
a borrowed linguistic erudition or (as the Latin West would call it)
"Hebraica Veritas" served the purpose of presenting the exegete's
credentials as a qualified philologist, credentials that were necessary no less for Christian scholarship than for Classical.
But sometimes a critical awareness of the differences between
the Hebrew original and the Greek translation could also become
a matter of great theological as well as philological import. Above
all, that issue was repeatedly brought home to Christians in their
encounters with Judaism, with which they shared "the divinely
inspired Scriptures" but not the christological interpretation of
those Scriptures; thus, the prophecy of Isaiah that read in the
Septuagint, and then in the New Testament, "Behold, the virgin
will conceive [idou, he parthenos en gastri exei]," which was
being applied to the Virgin Mary by Christians, did not, according to Jewish philology and Jewish exegesis of the original
224
Ath Ar A.
{PG 26:125)
Prv 8:22
_ _
Hebrew, refer to the Virgin at all, neither to the Virgin Mary nor
y o t n e r v ' r S m > b u t simply to "a young woman of marriageable age." But perhaps the most crucial passage where the theological import of the relation between the Hebrew and the Greek
manifested itself in the intramural Christian disputes of the
fourth century was the saying quoted earlier from personified
Sophia in the Book of Proverbs: " The Lord created me [ektise me]
as the arche of his ways for all his works." Basil insisted that this
was the only passage in all of Scripture that seemed to say something like this, and he explained as well that Solomon in the Book
of Proverbs, though undoubtedly inspired by God, had made it a
practice to speak obscurely and in parables. But then he went on,
in his refutation of the theory of Eunomius according to which
this passage made Christ as Sophia-Logos the creature through
whom God had made all the other creatures, to cite the authority
of "other translators" w h o had rendered the Hebrew more faithfully with "The Lord possessed me [ektesato me] as the arche of
his ways for all his works" rather than "The Lord created me
t o an
Bas..2.20
(SC 305:84)
Ath./ir.2.i8-22
(PG 26:184-93)
(Jaeger2358)
Bas..2.2
1- J 5 c 4
<,.?
Gr.Nyss.EMM.2.286
(Jaeger 1:310)
[ektisen me] as the arche of his ways for all his works." This was a
theological point that had appeared before Basil, in the response
0 f Athanasius to the Arian exegesis of the passage, and that then
appeared again, in the defense of Basil against Eunomius by
Gregory of Nyssa. Although the Cappadocians often spoke
vaguely of "other translators" or sometimes of "the learned in
>
such matters" in identifying the source for all this information
about the Hebrew text and about the differences between the
Septuagint and the versions of Aquila, Symmachus, Theodotion,
and other Greek translators, there is every reason to believe that it
had come to them in considerable measure from that massive sixthousand-page compilation of sacred philology known as the
Hexapla. Prepared by Origen of Alexandria between 228 and
245, the Hexapla is now largely lost except for fragments, some
of which have been preserved in the writings of the Cappado-
Field 1875,1:7513
cians.
Brooks 1991,108-9
Fennema 1985,12435 ,
McReynoIds 1981,10518
Gr.Naz.p.202
(PG 37:333)
Norris 1991,1735203
Gr.Nyss.Re/.8;6i;i62
(Jaeger 2:3i5;336;38o)
Bas.Spir.8.19
(SC 17:312)
Sanders 1971,1517
Brooks 1991,235
Gr.Nyss.Ref.z
(Jaeger 2:312-13)
Fedwick 1981,1:33760
Ps 30:20
Gr.Nyss.Or.catec/?. 17.3
(Meridier 92)
1 Cor 13:12
Gr.Nyss.Cant.11
{PG 44:1001)
Gr.Nyss. V.Mos. 2
(Jaeger 7 - 1 : I I O - I I )
Gr.Nyss. Cant.6
(Jaeger 6:190)
2 Cor 3:15
225
22.6
Gr.Nyss.GjHt.pr.
(Jaeger 6:4-5)
Gr.Nyss.K.2..85
(Jaeger 1:251)
Gr.Nyss.Hex.
(PG 44:121)
Bas.Ep.42.3
(Courtonne 1:103)
Bas.Hex.9.1
[SC 26:478-80)
Acts 1:6-7
Bas.Ep.8.7
(Courtonne 1:31)
Bas.Leg.lib.gent.z
(Wilson zi)
Bas.5pzr.14.31
(SC 17:354)
Pl.Cn'.io7c-d
Pl.R. 514-17
Col 2:1617
Ex 25:40;Heb 10:1
(PG 36:637)
18
"the visible things as an adumbration of and design for the invisible things." He made productive use of the typological method to
spiritualize the history of the Jewish Exodus into an allegory for
the resurrection of Christ ("pascha" being the Greek name both
for the Jewish Passover and for the Christian Easter): "Yesterday
the lamb was slain and the door posts were anointed, and Egypt
bewailed her firstborn, and the destroyer passed us over.. . . Today we have completely escaped from Egypt and from Pharaoh;
and there is none to hinder us from keeping a feast to the Lord
our God, the feast of our own exodus [heorten ten exodion]." Yet
this method, also as it was carried on by Nazianzen, manifested
its ties with the Classical heritage, and not only with the Christian heritage. Some Christian exegetes practiced allegory without
being aware that pagans were also doing so; some condemned
pagan allegory but did not resort to it themselves; and some
avoided it but did not condemn the pagans for using it. But
Gregory, while criticizing the pagan allegory of Classical poems
and myths as unwarranted, admitted at the same timeto the
emperor Julian, who was well aware of itthat a similar allegory
16
was also being practiced "within our own circle." Because it was
within the circle, he also warned his Christian hearers, after an
extensive typological interpretation of Old Testament sacrifices,
not to "carry any of this abroad." He added the explanation:
"Most of our mysteries may not be carried out to those who are
G N
See pp.212.-23
:
-'
N
(SC 247:74-76)
G N Or
(SC 309:282)
Gr Naz Or
2.27
(PG 36:645)
GrN O catech 1
(Meridier 20)
See p.43
Gr.Naz.Or.21.22
G N7C)5 8 8
(SC 250:164)
on the outside."
'* w a s t n u s a n advantage to share with one's opponents an
acceptance of the same biblical authority. Nevertheless, the realities of theological polemics made it clear that such an acceptance
of authority was not sufficient of itself to guarantee agreement on
doctrine. At the Synod of Seleucia in 3 59, Gregory of Nazianzus
reported, "the ancient and pious doctrine that defended the Trinity was abolished, by setting up a palisade and battering down the
homoousion," on the grounds that this Nicene term did not
appear in Scripture (any more, he might have added, than "Trinity [trias]" itself did). Yet this argument from Scripture, he
charged, was a pretext for "really introducing unscriptural
Arianism." That heresy in turn was, according to Nazianzen, the
result of refusing to let "faith rather than reason lead us." In
opposition to it, he joined Basil and Nyssen in trying to argue
dialectically, but then he turned to biblical authority. "Now that
we know just how invincible you are in logical twists," he asserted sarcastically to Eunomius, "let us see what strength you
2z8
Gr.Naz.Or.29.16-17
(SC 250:212)
Gr.Naz.Or.43.69
(PG 36:589)
Florovsky 1:8589
Bas. Leg.lib.gent.7
(Wilson 27)
See pp.25253
See pp. 3 0 4 - 5
1 Cor 2:7
Amand de Mendieta
1965,21-39
Bas.Spir.27.66
(SC 17:478-80)
Pelikan 1971Pelikan 19714:276-77
1,4:121
can muster from Holy Scripture!" The reason for citing Scripture
as the ultimate authority, he declared, was this: "We, after all,
understand and preach the divinity of the Son on the basis of its
grand and sublime language." At the same time, the biblical case
for orthodox doctrine did not imply that there was any uniformity in that "grand and sublime language"; for among the evangelists, there were "some more occupied with the human side of
Christ, and others paying attention to his deity." The reason for
this was: "Some [the Synoptic Gospels] commenced their history
with what is within our experience, others [the Gospel of John]
with what is above us." But if heretics, too, could quote Scripture,
the standard of orthodoxy, in order to be faithful to Scripture,
had to involve something more than Scripture, namely, the traditions of the church. For the Cappadocians said that it was characteristic of the truth of revelation, as they knew it had also been of
Classical paganism, that "the virtuous deeds of the men of old
were preserved for us, either through an unbroken oral tradition
or through being preserved in the words of poets or writers of
prose."
The most critical example of this problem of Scripture and
tradition in Cappadocian theology was the doctrine of the Holy
Spirit, because of the ambiguities of scriptural usage and the
undeveloped state of biblical and ecclesiastical doctrine. To deal
with the paucity in the Scriptures of explicit instances of the
identification of the Spirit as "God," Basil invoked the authority
of nonbiblical traditions: "Of the beliefs and practices, whether
generally accepted or publicly enjoined, which are preserved in
the church, some we possess derived from written teaching [ton
en tei ekklesiai pephylagmenon dogmaton kai kerygmaton ta
men ek tes eggraphou didaskalias]; others we have received delivered to us 'in a mystery' by the tradition of the apostles [ek tes ton
apostolon paradoseos]; and both of these in relation to true religion have the same force. And these no one will gainsayno one,
at all events, who is even moderately versed in the institutions of
the church. For were we to attempt to reject such customs as have
no written authority [ta agrapha ton ethon], on the ground that
the importance they possess is small, we should unintentionally
injure the gospel in its very vitals; or, rather, we should make our
public definition a mere phrase and nothing more." This passage
continued to be quoted for many centuries also in the Latin West,
being incorporated into Gratian's collection of canon law and
then figuring in the controversies of the Reformation. But the
22.9
most intriguing aspect of it here is its relation to the metamorphosis of natural theology; for as has been suggested earlier,
in the thought of the Cappadocians natural theology and religious tradition were not seen as antitheticalas they were in
the Classical period, and would be again during the Enlightenmentbut as complementary and mutually supportive.
Nm 4:2.o;Ex 30:io;Lv
16
Bas.Spir.zy .66
(SC 17:482)
Gr.Nyss. V.Mos. 1 ;z
ger7-I:7-8;i39)
See p.112
Gr.Nyss. Or.dom. 5
(PG 44:1184)
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
V.Macr. (Jaeger 8-1:396)
Gr.Naz.Or.31.25-26
(SC 250:324-26)
Jude3
Gr.Nyss. Cant.i 5
(Jaeger 6:436)
230
Bas. Hex. 1. 2.
(sc 2.6:96)
GrNa
(SC 250:124)
Bas B
(SC 305:88)
God who was "a worthy object of love for all beings endowed
with reason, the kalon most to be desired, the arche of all existing
things, the source of life, intellectual light." For other ways of
knowing, including the way of reason, were simultaneously refuted and yet fulfilled by following the way of faith. And nowhere
did that paradox manifest itself more dramatically for them than
in the "chief dogma" of revealed religion, the doctrine of God as
Trinity.
CHAPTER
15
Bas.wM.2.22
(SC 305:88)
Meijering 1968
Vandenbussche 1944,
47-72-
Hanson 1988,676-737
Gr.Nyss. Maced.
(Jaeger 3 - I : I O I )
Gr.Naz.Or.31.15
(SC 250:304)
3I
2-32-
N a t u r a l Theology as Presupposition
Gr.Naz.Or.38.15
(PG 36:318-29)
Gr.Nyss.w.3.2.94
(Jaeger 2:83)
Bas.Ep.8.3
(Courtonne 1:26)
Stephan 1938,25-38;
Prestige 1956,24264
Eun.ap3as.Eun.
(SC 299:232)
1.17
Bas.Eun.i.zy
(SC 299:266)
Eun.ap.Gr.Nyss.K.
i - i j i (Jaeger 1:72)
Gr.Nyss.EwM.1.156
(Jaeger 1:74)
Gr.Nyss.EHH.3.1.136
(Jaeger 2:49)
Gr.Nyss.EwB. 3.2.8
(Jaeger 2:54)
See pp.22425
Jni:i8
Gr.Nyss.wM.3.6.63
(Jaeger 2:208)
Bas.Sprr.8.20
(SC 17:316-18)
Gr.Nyss.Re/". 127-28
(Jaeger 2:367)
Pelikan 1971-89.
1:21125
Bas.5pzr.19.49
(SC 17:41822)
Gr.Nyss.ftd.
(Jaeger 3-1:66)
Ps 142:10
Gr.Naz.Or.31.8
(SC 250:290)
Bas.p.38.4
(Courtonne 1:85)
Gr.Naz.Or.6.12
(PG 35:737)
Gr.Nyss. Comm.not.
(Jaeger 3-1:21-22)
2.33
of John (and with the textual variant of which he was fond), " N o
one has ever seen God; but the only-begotten God, who is nearest
to the Father's heart, has made him known," Gregory of Nyssa
affirmed: "The main point of Christian orthodoxy is to believe
that the only-begotten God, who is the truth and the true light, is
truly all that he is said to be . . . , who never at any time was not,
nor ever will cease to be, whose being, such as it essentially is, is
beyond the reach of the curiosity that would try to comprehend
it." Thus, the Son shared fully in the transcendence of the Father;
as Nyssen declared later in the treatise, "There is no kinship
between the created world and all the things which the orthodox
doctrine assumes that we assert concerning God the only Son."
The alternative was to deny the Son a participation in the eternal
and transcendent being of the Godhead. His divine nature, too,
had to be described in apophatic language and in alpha privatives, as remaining "incapable of evil, unchangeable, unalterable." In taking upon themselves, for the first time in Christian
history, an extended and thorough exploration of the doctrine of
the Holy Spirit, as it fell to the generation of the Cappadocians to
do, it was likewise necessary to acknowledge the Spirit as a fully
transcendent being, beyond anything conceivable by the human
mind. The creation could be called good "because of its participation in the transcendent good"; but by contrast with this participation by the creation, the participation of the Holy Spirit in
the transcendent good of the divine nature was eternal and without beginning, essential and not derivative, by nature and not by
grace, as the biblical title "your good Spirit" showed. Both the
"begetting of the Son" and the "procession of the Spirit" within
the Godhead, consequently, remained ineffable and transcendent.
A fundamental component of the trinitarian dogma, therefore, was the confession that all three of the divine hypostases in
the Trinity shared in the apophatic qualities of the divine nature:
"the communion and the distinction" within the Trinity remained "ineffable and inconceivable." So did the harmony and
freedom from conflict that the hypostases shared. The Nicene
dogma did not abolish the need for apophasis, as a shallow interpretation of orthodox doctrine might have led someone to suppose. If anything, orthodox trinitarianism intensified that need,
for any increase in knowledge about God (above all, the revelation of the knowledge of God as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit)
ultimately consisted in an increase in the knowledge that God
was and remained incomprehensible and transcendent. The mys-
234
Gr.Nyss.Gm.3
(Jaeger 6:85) .
2 Cor 12:3-4
Gr.Nyss.M.2.io6
(Jaeger 1:257-58)
1 Tm 3:16
Eun.ap.Gr.Nyss.EK.
3-9-54 (Jaeger 2:284)
Gr.Nyss.E.3.9.56;59
(Jaeger 2:28586)
Symb.Nic.-CP
(Alberigo-Jedin 24)
Bas.Hex.2.2
{SC 26:146)
Gr.Nyss.EKM.3.6.12
(Jaeger 2:185)
Gr.Nyss.H0m.0pif.23
(PG 44:212)
N a t u r a l Theology as Presupposition
tery of divine being transcended not only the rational and philosophical constructs of Classical natural theology but the revealed
and orthodox truth of the church's dogmatic theology itself. For
"every doctrine concerning the ineffable nature," no matter how
sublime, divinely inspired, and orthodox it was, was still "only a
copy of the gold, not the gold itself," involving as it did "words so
secret as to be unrepeatable by human lips." So profound and
transcendent was that mystery, also for Christian revelation and
for orthodox theology, that Gregory of Nyssa was constrained to
explain: "Whoever searches the whole of revelation will find
there no doctrine of the divine nature at all, nor indeed a doctrine
of anything else that has a substantial existence, so that we pass
our lives in ignorance of much, being ignorant first of all of
ourselves as human beings, and then of all other things besides,"
including the soul and its relation to the body. He was moved to
this explanation in part by his shock at the declaration of Eunomius that the specific content of "the mystery of our religion"
was "exactness of doctrines" rather than "the distinctive character of customs and sacramental tokens." In opposition to this
Gregory insisted that it was a characteristic of paganism, but not
of Christianity, "to think of a piety consisting in doctrines only."
And the doctrine of the Trinity, being a doctrine about why Father, Son, and Holy Spirit must (as the Nicene Creed required)
"be worshiped and glorified together," was no exception to this
rule.
As the Cappadocians found it consistent with the apophatic
definition of transcendence in their natural theology to predicate
such a transcendence of the Son and the Holy Spirit in the revealed doctrine of the Trinity, so they also drew a line from their
apologetic definition of creation as a creatio ex nihilo to the
trinitarian dogma. That definition of creation was drawn in opposition to the Classical teaching that creation had a "double
arche," with matter coming to the Creator "from without" and
therefore having an eternal existence of its own. But when Eunomius tried to apply the same schematism to the doctrine of the
Trinity by teaching "the transition of the only-begotten one from
nothing into being," which Gregory of Nyssa described as "the
doctrine that he who made us and all creation out of nothing is
himself out of nothing," Gregory rejected that as a "horrible and
godless doctrine, more to be shunned than all impiety." And yet,
for a rather curious reason, the Cappadocians found that the
Classical idea of creation as involving "two eternal and unbegotten existences, having their being concurrently with each other"
Bas.Hex.3.2
(SC 26:19294)
Bas.Spir.z.4
(SC 17:262)
Gr.Nyss.EH.3.9.21
(Jaeger 2:271)
Gr.Nyss.EMM.1.381
(Jaeger 1:138-39)
Eun.ap.Gr.Nyss.Eww.
3.6.60 (Jaeger 2:207)
Ps 144:13
Gr.Nyss. Maced.
(Jaeger 3 - I : i o i )
Gr.Naz.Or.29.3
(SC 250:182)
Gr.Nyss. Maced.
(Jaeger 3-1:98)
Gr.Nyss.Tres dii
(Jaeger 3-1:56)
2-3 5
236
Gr.Nyss.En.3.6.2819 '
(Jaeger 1:196)
Gr.Nyss.Re/'.89-94
(Jaeger 2:348-50)
Gr.Nyss.EMM. 1.686
(Jaeger 1:223)
Gr.Nyss.Tres dii
(Jaeger 3-1:57)
D T C 10:22018
See pp.1034
N a t u r a l T h e o l o g y as Presupposition
Gr.Nyss.EMH.1.358
(Jaeger 1:132-33)
Gr.Nyss.Eww. 2.6.51
(Jaeger 2:203-4)
Gr.Nyss.EMK.3.10.46
(Jaeger 2:307)
Gr.Nyss.EwM.1.533
(Jaeger 1:180)
Bas.Spir.10.26
(SC 17:336)
Rom 6:17
Gr.Nyss.Re^.io
(Jaeger 2:316)
See pp. 8 7-89
Gr.Nyss.EwM. 1.548
(Jaeger 1:184-85)
Gr.Nyss.Re/.io
(Jaeger 2:316)
37
Z38
Sefcpp.235 36
Gr.Nyss.E.j.^.36
(Jaeger i:r$8)
Gr.Nyss.Ett/7.2.558
(Jaeger 1:389)
Has.Hex.1.56
(SC 26:108-10)
Gr.Naz.Or.29.2
(SC 250:178)
Gr.Naz.or.25.16
(SC 284:194)
Gr.Naz.Or. 20.67
(SC 270:68-72)
Gr.Nyss.Tre5 dii
(Jaeger 3-1:37-57)
Bas.Ep.125.3
(Courtonne 2:34)
JM 15:1s
GN F
(Jaeger 1:75)
a -6
|TC 5:1309-43
GN o
6(sc 170:68-71)
Jn 15:16
g
{Sc 150:190)
GrN
(SC 250:180)
~ x,
Gr.Naz.Or.15.16
(SC 184:198)
GrN En
8-86
(Jaeger 1:166-67)
2.39
proceeded from the Father. At the same time it was the unanimous assertion of this orthodox trinitarianism that in speaking
about the Trinity the fundamental ontological terms, such as
ousia, were not to be restricted to the Father but had to include
tne
^ o n an< ^ t ^ ie Hty Spirit, and yet that they had to be used only
in the singular.
In this context it should not be construed as an unwarranted
anachronism, but as a legitimate question a posteriori, to inquire
about the position of the Cappadocians on the notorious issue of
the Filioque, the medieval Western doctrine of the eternal procession of the Holy Spirit, not from the Father only, but "from the
Father and the Son [ex Patre Filioque]," which has for so long
been a matter of dogmatic dispute between the Eastern and the
Western churches. For the acknowledgment of the orthodoxy
and authority of the Cappadocian fathers by both East and West
has made their answer to this question, as well as their careful
attention to the need for theological precision about only one
"cause [aitia]" and only one arche in the Trinity as essential to
monotheism, an important issue not only for historical research
but for theological inquiry and ecumenical discussion. All of the
Cappadocians, where to a Western ear a reference to the Filioque
would have seemed to be in place, repeatedly avoided it. Gregory
of Nazianzus, on the basis of the words of Christ, "The Spirit of
truth that proceeds from the Father," explicitly spoke in such a
way as to attribute the source of the proceeding of the Spirit to the
Father, not to the Son. Quoting those same words of Christ elsewhere, he warned: "Let us confine ourselves within our limits,
and speak of the unbegotten [the Father] and the begotten [the
Son] and that which proceeds from the Father [the Holy Spirit]."
Thus he could describe "the Father as 'parent' of the offspring
[the Son] and originator of the 'emanation' [the Spirit]," but in a
manner characterized apophatically by "apatheia, nontemporality, and noncorporeality." For the Godhead was "common
to the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit," but what was
common to the Son and the Holy Spirit in turn was "their being
i f
2.4
Gr.Nyss.Cowm.not.
(Jaeger 3-1:124-25)
Bas.Ettw.2.34
(SC 305:142)
Jn 15:26
Gr.Nyss.tt. 1.41314
(Jaeger 1:147)
ap.Draseke 1907,
390400
Lohn 1929,35464
Gomes de Castro
1938,114-17
Gt.Nyss.Maced.
(Jaeger 3-1:89-90)
CHor.(i438- 4 5 ) Def.
(Alberigo-Jedin 525)
Gonzalez 1938,280301
Gr.Nyss.Mflced.
(Jaeger 3-1:109)
Gr.Nyss.Tres dii
(Jaeger 3-I.47-4
N a t u r a l Theology as Presupposition
opon], and that the person of the Father, from which the Son is
begotten and from which the Holy Spirit proceeds." Basil, too,
spoke axiomatically about the Holy Spirit as "proceeding from
the Father." That consistency would seem, though admittedly at
least somewhat on the basis of an argument from silence, to line
up all three of the Cappadocian fathers against the Filioque.
But such language was in part the reflection of the usage of the
New Testament when it spoke about the "proceeding" of the
Holy Spirit, and in part the observance of what they themselves
called the "natural order" in speaking about the three hypostases. For alongside the explicit identification of the Father, and
the Father only, as "cause" and arche, other kinds of language
also appeared in the writings of the Cappadocians; and such
language has often been taken by Western theologians as favoring
the doctrine of the Filioque, albeit sometimes on the basis of texts
that are rather problematical. For example, arguing for the doctrine that the Holy Spirit had "an exact identity" with the Father
and with the Son, Gregory of Nyssa declared, consciously speaking "in accordance with Scripture," that the Spirit was "from
God [the Father] and of Christ," with the English "from" representing the Greek preposition "ek" and the English "of" representing the Greek genitive case. And that was indeed "in accordance with Scripture," which repeatedly employed the genitive to
identify the Holy Spirit as "the Spirit of" Christ or of the Son or
of the Lord. In addition, the Cappadocians sometimes made use
of a formula that more than a millennium later, at the Council of
Florence in 1439, became a point of discussion as a possible
compromise between East and West: "The Holy Spirit proceeds
from the Father through the Son [ek patros di' hyiou, ex Patre per
Filium]." Much of the time, it seems, the Cappadocians were-invoking such language in dealing not with the eternal relations of
the hypostases to one another within the Trinity according to
theology (which was the specific point at issue in the Filioque
dispute), but with the historical dispensations of the Trinity toward the world and the church according to economy. Thus,
Gregory of Nyssa was speaking economically when he said:
"Whatever is kalon, whatever is good [agathon], coming from
God as it does through the Son, is completed by the instrumentality of the Spirit." And elsewhere he asserted: "Every operation
that extends from God to creation and that is designated according to our differing conceptions of it has its origin in the Father,
proceeds through the Son, and reaches its completion by the
Holy Spirit." But a few sentences later it does seem that he was
Gr.Nyss.Tres dii
(Jaeger 3-1:48-49)
Gr.Naz.O.31.8
{SC 250:290)
Gr.Nyss.Or.attecfo.9.1
(Meridier 64)
ap.Gr.Nyss.EK. 3.3.19
(Jaeger 2:114)
Gr.Nyss.EHM.3.1.54
(Jaeger 2:22)
Gr.Nyss.EHn.1.23132
(Jaeger 1:94-95)
Gr.Nyss.Maced.
(Jaeger 3-1:90)
2.41
speaking not only according to economy but according to theology when he declared: "There is one motion and disposition of
the good will that is communicated from the Father through the
Son to the Spirit." From the perspective of the Cappadocians, at
least some of the polemical literature on the Filioque in subsequent centuries would also seem to have crossed the boundaries
of reverent and apophatic propriety by claiming to be better
informed than it had any right to be about the mysterious inner
life of the Trinity and the eternal theological relations of the
divine hypostases to one another. Thus it would appear to have
merited the rhetorical outburst of Gregory of Nazianzus: "What,
then, is 'proceeding'? You explain the ingeneracy of the Father
and I will give you a biological account of the Son's begetting and
the Spirit's proceedingand let us go mad the pair of us for
prying into God's secrets!"
Probably the most obvious contribution of the natural theology of the Cappadocians to their dogmatic theology came in their
use of arguments for this dogmatic theology that were based on
what was seen as "fitting to say about God [theoprepon]" in the
light of their natural theology (which they treated as common
property with their heretical as well as with their philosophical
opponents). Eunomius objected to Basil's doctrine on the
grounds, "The very nature of things is repugnant to this." But
Gregory of Nyssa, when comparing the theology of Eunomius
with that of Basil and himself, did seem to be proceeding in a
similar fashion when he issued the challenge: "Let the intelligent
reader . . . judge which better preserves in the text those conceptions that are befitting the divine." He felt able to aver with
confidence: "The most boorish and simpleminded would not
deny that the divine nature, blessed and transcendent as it is, is
'single.' That which is viewless, formless, and sizeless cannot be
conceived of as multiform and composite." From this he concluded: "Who does not know that, to be exact, simplicity [haplotes] in the case of the Holy Trinity admits of no degrees?" He
seemed to be explicitly invoking a somewhat similar argument
from the generalities of natural theology to the particularities of
revealed theology when, in his treatise on the Holy Spirit, he
proceeded "on the basis of the common conceptions" concerning
the divine natureat least possibly meaning conceptions that
were common to all, not only to believersto show that the Holy
Spirit, as spoken of in inspired Scripture, was fully entitled to the
name " God." Gregory of Nazianzus, dealing with the same problem, asked the general question, "What is deity if it is incom-
24 z
Gr.Naz.Or.31.4
(SC 250:282)
Schermann 1901
Gr.Nyss. Or.catech.pr.6
(Meridier 6)
Rasneur 1903,189206,41131
Bas.p.8.3
(Courtonne 1:2527)
Bas.Eim.2.4
(SC 305:18)
Heb 1:3
N a t u r a l Theology as Presupposition
plete?" and then proceeded to the specific declaration: "Something is missing if it does not have holiness, and how could it have
holiness without having the Holy Spirit?" It is noteworthy that it
should so often have been in the process of proving their doctrine
of the Holy Spirit that the Cappadocians had recourse to such
argumentation. For the presupposition of their case was a doctrine of God and of the divine nature that they had established as
both rational and scriptural primarily in the course of their ongoing controversy about the relation of the Father and the Son. That
presupposition now went on to become a fundamental part of
their theological methodology, and they could now employ it on
the doctrine of the Holy Spirit with the rise of the new challenge
that their generation was the first to confront.
At the center of the most celebrated (and most controverted)
formula of the trinitarian confession, as affirmed by the declaration of the Council of Nicaea that the Son was "homoousios with
the Father," was a concept that also belonged to Cappadocian
natural theology, the concept of ousia. Gregory of Nyssa, therefore, was able to argue on the basis of the principle, evident to
anyone who was "reasonable," that although Adam was unbegotten and his son Seth was begotten, nevertheless they had an
"essential nature marked by the same characteristics," and that
therefore there was "one ousia in both." Having made that point
in natural theology, he felt entitled to continue: "What, then, we
learn in the case of human nature by means of the inferential
guidance afforded to us by the definition, this I think we ought to
take for our guidance also to the pure apprehension of the divine
doctrines. For when we have shaken off from the divine and
exalted doctrines all carnal and material notions, we shall be
most surely led by the remaining conception, once it is purged of
such ideas, to the lofty and unapproachable heights." When the
natural concept of ousia was applied to the revealed doctrine of
the Trinity, it led to the homoousios. Dealing as it did with "the
Father as God in ousia, who generated the Son as God in ousia,'1''
the doctrine of the Trinity could not be rendered adequately by
the compromise term, "similar in ousia [homoiousios]." The
reason, according to Basil, was this: "Similarity and dissimilarity
are predicated in relation to quality, and the divine is free of
quality. . . . From this the bomoousia is proved." For it was not
only a revealed principle but a natural and rational one that a
diversity of name did not imply a diversity of ousia. To this nonbiblical vocabulary it was appropriate to adapt the vocabulary of
biblical usage. Thus the Epistle to the Hebrews spoke of Christ as
GT.Nyss.Eun.3.2.147
(Jaeger 2:100)
Phil 2:6
Bas.E.i.i8
(SC 299:236)
Symb.Hic.
(Alberigo-Jedin 5)
Prestige 1956,233-34
Gr.NaE.Or.ii.35
(SC 270:184-86)
Grandsire 1923,130-52
Bas.fp.214.4
(Courtonne 2:205)
Strong 1901,224-35;
1902,2240; 1903,
28-45
Martland 1965,252-63;
Altaner 1950,17-24;
Altaner 1951,57-58
M3
"the stamp of God's very being [charakter tes hypostaseos autou]." And the biblical term "morphe" in the phrase of the Epistle to the Philippians, "He was in the form of God [en morphei
theou hyparchon]," meant the same as the term ousia.
But the passage from Hebrews also documented a vexing
problem of trinitarian terminology, for it did seem to be using
hypostasis in the sense of ousia. The two terms appeared as synonyms also in the original text of the creed adopted at Nicaea in
32.5 when it condemned "those who say that [the Son] is of
another hypostasis or ousia than the Father." As G. L. Prestige
has pointed out, "the Cappadocian Settlement finally fixed the
statement of Trinitarian orthodoxy in the formula of one ousia
and three hypostaseis. It was worked out largely by Basil . . . ,
preached by the inspired populariser, Gregory of Nazianzus, and
elaborated by the acute and speculative mind of Gregory of
Nyssa." That "Cappadocian Settlement" became even more
complicated because of the differences between East and West,
differences of language that in this period as in all periods also
seemed to become differences of thought and belief. As Gregory
of Nazianzus noted, ""We use in an orthodox sense the terms 'one
ousia' and 'three hypostases,' the one to denote the nature of the
Godhead, the other the properties of the three. The Italians mean
the same; but, owing to the scantiness of their vocabulary and its
poverty of terms, they are unable to distinguish between ousia
and hypostasis, and therefore introduce the term 'persons [prosopa],' to avoid being understood as asserting three ousiai. The
result, were it not piteous, would be laughable. This slight difference of sound was taken to indicate a difference of faith." Basil
observed that some Western writers had, " from a suspicion of the
inadequacy of their own [Latin] language, taken over the word
ousia from Greek." Part of the difficulty for the Latins lay in the
linguistic tradition of translating the Greek word hypostasis with
the Latin word " substantia," of which it was the literal rendering,
as the Latin "essentia" was the literal rendering of the Greek
ousia. When, as in the passage from the creed of Nicaea just
quoted, hypostasis and ousia were more or less synonymous, it
created little difficulty to speak indiscriminately of one "substantia" or of one "essentia" in the Godhead. Augustine, whose treatise De Trinitate was by common consent one of the most profound ever written in Latin on the subject, acknowledged, a full
two generations after the Cappadocians and perhaps on the basis
of a reading of them in Latin translation, "The Greeks intend to
posit a difference, though I do not know what it is, between ousia
~^PT
Aug.Trirz.5.8,10
{CCSL 50:21617)
Aug.T.7.6.ii
(CCSL 50:261)
Gr.Nyss.Eww.1.235
(Jaeger 1:95)
Gonzalez 1939,193
Gr.Nyss..3.i.75
(Jaeger 2:30)
Bas.Ep.38.2
(Courtonne 1:82)
Ras.Eun.z.zz
(SC 305:88)
N a t u r a l t h e o l o g y as Presupposition
Gr.Nyss. Or.catech.}.}
(Meridier 20)
Gr.Nyss. Fid.3
(Jaeger 3-1:62)
Gr.Nyss.EMM.2.1415
(Jaeger 1:231)
Bas.iip.189.34
(Courtonne 2:13435)
Gn 1:26
Gn 1:27
Bas.Hex.9.6
(SC 26:520)
Gr.Naz.Or.38.8
(PG 35:320)
Gr.Naz.Or.20.6
(SC 270:70)
Gr.Naz.Or.22.12
(SC 270:244)
245
246~
N a t u r a l Theology as Presupposition
Koperski 1936,4565
Gr.Nyss.Tres dii
(Jaeger 3-1:39)
Gr.Nyss. Cotnm.not.
(Jaeger 3-1:19)
Gr.Nyss.Re/:
(Jaeger 2:32.8
Gr.Naz.Or.40.43
(PG 35:420)
Gr.Naz.Or.31.12
(SC 250:300)
Arnou 1934,24254
Gr.Naz.Or.6.13
(PG 35:740)
Jn 10:30
See pp.104-5
Bas.Ep.8.2
(Courtonne 1:24)
Bas.Sp/r.18.44
(SC 17:4024)
Gr.Naz.Or.29.2
(SC 250:180)
Gr.Naz.or.25.15
(SC 284:192)
Mateo-SecoBasrero
1988,353-79
Symb.Nic.
(Alberigo-Jedin 5)
Gr.Nyss.Ewn.3.2.94
(Jaeger 2:83)
2-47
religion." When Christian orthodoxy confessed "each of the hypostases singly," it did not "let an ignorant arithmetic carry us
away to the idea of a plurality of gods." Trinitarian monotheism,
consequently, was seen as a distinctive view of oneness, "a monotheism not limited to one prosopon," in which there was numerical distinction but no severance of ousia. "Therefore," Gregory
of Nazianzus concluded, "unity having from all eternity arrived
by motion [within itself] at duality, found its rest in trinity."
"This," he added, "is what we mean by Father and Son and Holy
Spirit." And it was in the name of what was "philosophical," by
which he seems to have meant here what was "theological," that
he pitted the dogma of the Trinity against polytheism. In the
Cappadocian system, trinitarian orthodoxy was seen as the overcoming of polytheism by drawing the primary distinction not
between spiritual and material reality, or between the visible and
the invisible realm (although both these distinctions were present
and prominent in the system), but ultimately between Creator
and creature, as the opening words of the Nicene Creed declared,
and then by putting the Logos and the Holy Spirit on God's side
of that metaphysical boundary. Replacing polytheism with this
kind of trinitarian monotheism did not imply a diminution of
deity. On the contrary, it redefined the very meaning both of deity
and of oneness, and thus it implied an infinite maximizing of
Godhead. And that was the sense in which the Cappadocians
could posit a consistency between their apologetics and their
dogmatics, by presenting their doctrine of the One as simultaneously a rejection of the many and an affirmation of the Three.
CHAPTER
16
S mbNicUz )
(Alberigo-Jedin 5)
. , .,. __
Symb.Ntc.-CP
(Alberigo-Jedin 14)
Seep.245
..
Gr.Nyss.CKK. 1.383
(Jaeger 1:139)
'
'
'
C o s m o s as Contingent Creation
Prestige 19x3,476-85
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:68-69)
Eun.ap.Gr.Nyss.Eww.
3.3.19 (Jaeger 2:114)
Gr.Nyss.BetfE.3
(PG 44:1118)
Gr.Nyss.Hom.opif.pr.
(PG 44:125)
Gr.Naz.Or.43.67
(PG 36:58s)
Bas.Hex.1.4
(SC 26:102)
Gr.Nyss.Or.aifecfc.i 8.4-4
(Meridier 94-96)
Gn 1:1
Z49
ciple of the Cappadocians, not only that the world was a cosmos
but that this cosmos in turn was a contingent creation: "one
God" as Trinity; this one trinitarian God as the "all-sovereign
Maker of all things"; the "visible things" as creatures; and the
"invisible things" as creatures.
The Cappadocians repeatedly made it clear that by their doctrine of creation they were not in the first instance contending for
a particular philosophical theory of cosmology or a scientific
worldview. For example, when, in the dialogue between Macrina
and Gregory of Nyssa about the soul and the resurrection,
Gregory had quoted various Classical or Christian theories about
where within the cosmos Hades might be physically located,
Macrina could be quite cavalier in her response, because, she said
with confidence, the Christian doctrine would "in no wise be
injured by such speculation." She gave this as her reason: "As
long as this objection does not shake our central doctrine of the
[continued] existence of those souls after the life in the flesh, there
need be, to our mind, no controversy about the whereabouts" of
Hades in the cosmos. In this sense the Cappadocians may be said
to have shared their opponents' interest in determining "the nature of things" not only on the basis of biblical authority but,
when appropriate, also on the basis of empirical evidence and of
scientific study. They brought natural theology as developed by
such evidence and study to their consideration of the biblical
testimony concerning the creation, as this was set down above all
in "the cosmogonic narrative" in the Book of Genesis. At
the same time, as Basil's commentary on that cosmogonic
narrativefor which Basil was praised by his fellow Cappadocians, both by his brother Gregory of Nyssa and by Gregory of
Nazianzusmade clear in great detail, they were acutely aware
of the severe limitations under which the empirical and scientific
consideration of the universe had to labor, and above all of its
inability, on the basis even of careful investigation, to construct a
valid and consistent teleology, something to which scientists and
philosophers "did not know how to raise themselves," and this
despite the insistence of the Cappadocians elsewhere that teleology was valid also as part of natural theology.
What both Gregorys had frequent occasion to praise above all
in Basil's exposition of Genesis, as well as frequent opportunity to
practice themselves, was the consistent identification of the God
who, according to the part of the Bible that Christians shared
with Jews, "created the heavens and the earth" with the God
who, according to the part of the Bible that was exclusively Chris-
2-5
N a t u r a l Theology as Presupposition
tian, was Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. For neither the name
"God" there in Genesis nor the term "one" in the creed was to be
taken "as indicating the Father alone, but as comprehending in its
significance the Son with the Father," together with the Holy
Spirit. Whenever he referred to "the one God," Gregory of Nyssa
explained, he meant "the one apprehended in the unchangeable
and eternal nature, the true Father and the only-begotten Son and
the Holy Spirit." On the basis of the narrative in Genesis and even
on the basis of natural theology, the economy of creation itself
could be seen as having taken place in a series of divine actions,
each set of creatures superior to its predecessors, ascending from
inanimate objects to plants to animals to humanity. (The angels
were, in some sense, superior to all of these, but for some reason
their creation had not been specifically mentioned in the cosmogonic narrative.) But God the Creator was to be affirmed as
the Holy Trinity, "the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit
eternally with one another in the perfect Trinity, before all creation and before all the aeons and before every sublime thought
[epinoia]." A failure to make that distinction between Creator
and creature with the utmost precision led to "a total transformation of the doctrines of religion into a kind of anarchy and democratic independence," in which the sovereignty of the Creator
was compromised and eventually dissolved into a plurality of
divine beings scattered throughout the cosmos. It was against
such "pluralism," which was only a euphemism for polytheism,
that the Cappadocian doctrine of the Trinity as Creator was directed.
In the Cappadocian system as in other systems in the history of
Christian thought, both earlier and later, the principal weight for
the defense of that doctrine, even when the issue was the doctrine
of the Holy Spirit, fell on the identification of the Logos and Son
of God as "the Creator of the universe" rather than a mere "instrument" of creation. It was an axiom, derived presumably from
the doctrine of God in natural theology and apparently shared by
the Cappadocians and their opponents, that God did not "stand
in need, in the act of creation, of matter or parts or natural
instruments." But from this axiomatic presupposition of natural
theology the two sides drew diametrically opposite trinitarian
conclusions with respect to the doctrine of creation: on the one
side, "the doctrine that [the Logos], who made us and all creation
out of nothing, was himself out of nothing," and therefore the
corollary notion of "the transition of the only-begotten one from
nothing into being"; and, in opposition to what the Cappa-
Gr.Nyss.Re/".20 21
(Jaeger 2:32021)
Gr.Nyss.Cawt.8
(Jaeger 6:257-58
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. {PG 46:57-60)
See p. 117
Gr.Nyss. Maced.
(Jaeger 3-1:98)
Gr.Nyss.EMM. 3.3.34
{Jaeger 2:108)
Bas.Sp/r.2.4
(SC 17:262)
Eun.ap.Gr.Nyss.Re^.
68-69 (Jaeger 2:340-41)
ap.Gr.Nyss.Ewtt.3.6.12
(Jaeger 2:185)
C o s m o s as C o n t i n g e n t Creation
Gr.Nyss.EMH.3.6.25
(Jaeger 2:195)
Gr.Nyss.Eim.3.6.59
(Jaeger 2:207)
Eun.ap.Gr.Nyss.Ewra.
3.6.60 (Jaeger 2:207)
Gr.Nyss.EMM. 1.3 81
(Jaeger 1:138-39)
Jn 1:1
Jn 1:3
Gn 1:1
Gn 1:3
Gr.Nyss.Apo//.
(Jaeger 3-1:191)
Seepp.238-40
Bas.Ep.125.3
(Courtonne 2:34)
Gonzalez 1938,180-301
DTC 13:646-47
Jn i:3;Gn 1:3
Jn 1:3
Z51
docians characterized as this "horrible and blasphemous utterance," the affirmation of a fundamental metaphysical "difference between [the Logos as] the Lord of creation and the general
body of creation." In support of the first of these conclusion,
Eunomius was represented as arguing: "If you allow that God the
Logos is to be believed to be eternal, then you must allow the
same of the things that have been created." But in response to
such an argument, the orthodox conclusion, by sharply distinguishing the metaphysical status of "God the Logos" from that of
"the things that have been created," asserted: "The begetting
[gennesis] of the Son does not fall within time, any more than the
creation was before time, so that it can in no way be right to
partition the indivisible, and, by declaring that there was a time
when the author of all existence did not exist, to insert this false
idea ot time into the creative source of the universe."
By linking its opening affirmation that the Logos had existed
already at the arche with the affirmation that followed almost
immediately, "Through him all things came to be," the Gospel of
John was evidently writing a gloss on the opening affirmation of
the Book of Genesis, "In the arche God created the heavens and
the earth," which was followed almost immediately by "God
said," speaking through his Word. Picking up on that use of
arche, Gregory of Nyssa declared: "God the Logos not only is the
one who is in the arche, but he is also himself the arche." This
Cappadocian usage of arche for the Logos, it should be stipulated
immediately, pertained not to the relations between the divine
hypostases within the Trinity, in which according to Cappadocian trinitarianism only the Father was the one arche, but specifically to the creation, which was the topic about which both the
Book of Genesis and the Gospel of John were speakingthus,
employing the technical trinitarian terminology of the Latin
West, to the "opera ad extra" rather than to the "opera ad intra"
of the Trinity. Drawing from the words of the Gospel of John and
of the Book of Genesis what he took to be the only possible
orthodox conceptualization of the relation between Trinity and
creation, and identifying the common ground between himself
and his opponents, Gregory of Nyssa reasoned as follows:
"Since, then, all things are of God, and the Son is God, the
creation is properly seen as the opposite of the Godhead, while,
since the only-begotten one is something other than the nature of
the universe (seeing that not even those who fight against the
truth contradict this), it follows of necessity that the Son also is
equally the opposite of the creation, unless the words of the saints
Z5Z
Gr.Nyss.EMM. 3.5.31
(Jaeger 2:171)
Gr.Nyss.MM. 2.50
(Jaeger 1:240)
Gr.Naz.Or.30.20
(SC 250:266-68)
Gr.Nyss.Hex.
(PG 44:73)
Bas.Hex.^.z
(5026:192-94)
Hanson 1988,676737
Gr.Nyss.Deit.
(PG 46:553-76)
Gr.Naz.Or.31
(SC 250:276342)
Bas.Spir.
(SC 17:250-530)
Gn 1:2
Bas.Spir.18.46
(SC 17:408)
Gn 1:2
has.Hex.z.6
(SC 26:166-68
Bas.Spir.22.53
(SC 17:440)
P\.Phd.97c-d
N a t u r a l Theology as Presupposition
are untrue which testify that 'through him all things came to
be.'" Earlier in the same treatise he also felt able to base his
argumentation on something he could call "the tenet that has
been held in common by all who have received the word of our
religion." As the Creator Logos, then, the Son of God was "related to the Father as word to mind," and was "existing inherently in real things," because everything was held together in the
Logos. In God, therefore, word and deed, Logos as word and
Logos as reason, coincided. For it was "conformable with true
religion" to insist on the apophatic principle that, in speaking at
the creation, God did not speak in human fashion and that the
Logos, as the Word and Reason of God in person, was ontologically the opposite of all creatures.
When, in the 360s and 370s, this long-standing controversy
about whether the Son of God was Creator or creature turned to
the closely related but by no means identical question of the
relation between the Holy Spirit and the creation, the writings of
the three Cappadocian fathers occupied a central position in that
development: Gregory of Nyssa's Sermon on the Deity of the Son
and Holy Spirit; the fifth and last of the Theological Orations of
Gregory of Nazianzus; and the treatise On the Holy Spirit by
Basil of Caesarea. The statement of the cosmogony of Genesis,
"The Spirit of God moved over the water," provided Basil, as the
author both of a word-by-word exposition of the Hexaemeron
and of the most celebrated of all fourth-century Greek works on
the Holy Spirit, with the need and the opportunity to find an
apophatic clarification of the relation between the doctrines of
Spirit and of creation. For the Spirit was "of God [theou]," but
not in the same sense that creatures were "of God"; the Spirit was
the "breath" and the "mouth" of God, but not as the words
"breath" and "mouth" applied to creatures. And so, he assured
his readers, "The close relation is made plain, while the mode of
the ineffable existence is safeguarded." The title "Spirit of God,"
therefore, was "the special name, the favorite name above all
others for Scripture to give to the Holy Spirit," from which Basil
concluded: "Always by 'pneuma theou' the Holy Spirit is meant,
the Spirit that completes the divine and blessed Trinity."
Like the Father and the Son, the Holy Spirit, too, was transcendent over all creatures. Nevertheless, also like the Father and
the Son, the Holy Spirit could in some degree be known by the
natural theology of the Greeks, with their intuitions about "the
mind of the universe" and the likeaccording to the Cappadocians, known better by them without the aid of specific revelation
N _
(SC 150:281-84)
.
)
(SC 17:4024
Seep.304
..
Lit.Has.
(Brightman 319-30)
KalHs 1989,132
LTK 3:935-37
Lampe 1005
Kelly 1950,136
See pp.41,49
153
than by the Sadducees, heretics among the Jews, who rejected the
doctrine of the Holy Spirit despite the testimony of their own
Scriptures. Perhaps even more than in the case of the second
hypostasis of the Trinity, the status of the third hypostasis did
depend on the definition of the doctrine of creation and thus also
on some clarification of natural theology. The system of numbering, "devised as a symbol indicative of the quantity of object,"
could, by a fallacious application to the doctrine of the Holy
Spirit, lead to speaking about the Holy Spirit as "third" and
therefore as somehow inferior, even though the principle, "Nothing undergoes any [substantive] change in consequence of the
addition of number," was true even in natural philosophy. The
best-known celebration of the intimate connection of the Holy
Spirit with the cosmos as contingent creation was by a Latin
Christian poet rather than by a Greek, and came from the ninth
century rather than from the fourth, in the "Veni Creator Spiritus." But it was the Greek rather than the Latin liturgy, and
specifically the Greek liturgy bearing the name of Basil of Caesarea, that extended the concept of the "Creator Spiritus" from
the cosmos to the Eucharist, by the invocation, in the epiclesis:
"Send now thy Spirit, the all-holy one, to descend upon us and
upon these gifts here set forth, so that this bread might be blessed
and sanctified and made manifest as the worshipful body of our
r
'
Lord and God and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen." As one commentary on the liturgy has summarized it, "The consecration . . . is
the work of the Holy Spirit, who transforms both the congregation and the gifts." That assignment of the eucharistic transformation to the invocation of the Holy Spirit, rather than to the
recitation of the words of institution "This is my body" and
"This is my blood," also became a point of controversy between
East and West.
To the affirmation of the oneness of God, both the Creed of
Nicaea in 3 Z5 and the Niceno-Constantinopolitan Creed of 3 81
added, in apposition, the title "all-sovereign Maker of all things,"
employing the Greek term "pantokrator," which could be used
either as an adjective or as a substantive; either way, the title was
predominantly, though not exclusively, Jewish and Christian,
there being "abundant authority for its use in the Septuagint"
(with well over a hundred occurrences) but relatively little documentation for it from Classical sources. Applying also to this title
the categories worked out for the doctrine of God in their apophatic theology, the Cappadocians were careful to specify that it
was a "relational" title, not an "absolute" one: "Accordingly,
254
Gr.Nyss..R<f.i26
(jaeger 2:366)
Bas.Hec.6.1
(SC 26:326)
ee pp.99-104
{PG 44.115)
..
,_
Gr.Nyss.EwM.2.14244
(jaeger 1:266-67)
. .
(sc 17:252)
See pp.220-30
Gr.Nyss.Hex.
G N*4 H
(PG 44:80)
Gr.Nyss.Re/.89-94
(jaeger 2^34 -50)
(jaeger 2:196)
..
Gr.Nyss.ww.2.29i
(jaeger 1:312)
'
tions under which God could be thought of as existing; for "pantokrator" was not an "absolute" title, but a "relational" one.
This reference to the "speaking" of God was, however, intended to provide justification for the critical intelligence, both in
its speculation and in its biblical exegesis, as Basil put it in his
treatise on the Holy Spirit, "to count the terms used in theology
as of primary importance, and to endeavor to trace out the hidden
meaning in every phrase and in every syllable," which was just
what the Cappadocians were constantly doing in their commentaries on the Hexaemeron and elsewhere. Forced as they were to
rely on Greek translations, they considered the implications, for
example, of alternate renderings of the Hebrew text of Genesis by
t le
' Septuagint and by the translations of Aquila and of Symmachus. Such scriptural terms as "begetting" were probed for
their bearing on the doctrine of creation as well as on the doctrine
j r j n j t y_ y n e s a r n e w a s d o n e with predominantly extrascripQ ^
tural terms for these doctrines, such as "causality [aitia]." The
purpose of such linguistic investigation was, nevertheless, not
chiefly philological at all, but philosophical and theological. As
Gregory of Nyssa put it, "The true power, and authority, and
dominion, and sovereignty of God do not, we think, consist in
syllables, because if that were so, any and every inventor of words
J
might claim equal honor with God." Whatever the human usage
of words may have been, therefore, a sound theology, natural or
C o s m o s as Contingent Creation
Gr.Nyss.EMM.3.2.154
:IO2)
Bas.Hex.8.7
(SC 26:470)
Gr.Nyss.Hex.
(PG 44:68)
See pp.99104
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:49)
Gr.Nyss.Amm.res.
(PG 46:64)
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:2528)
2-55
revealed, required that the term "to be" when applied to creatures be understood as meaning "to be created"that is, not
possessing an independent reality. The God who was "pantokrator" and "Maker of all things," consequently, had "created nothing unnecessarily and omitted nothing necessary." For the ultimate ground of all created realities was "in the power of God's
foreknowledge." This was the God who, as the "all-sovereign
Maker of all things," also filled the universe, yet without being
identified with it.
But the Nicene and Niceno-Constantinopolitan creeds, and
the Cappadocians as expositors of the Nicene faith and of "the
cosmogonic narrative," were concerned with the implications
not only of the words "all-sovereign Maker," but also of the
words that followed: "of all things, whether visible or invisible."
This concern manifested itself not alone in their meticulous attention to scientific data but in both their natural theology and
their dogmatic theology. Although Macrina was determined to
assign primary authority to "the Holy Scriptures [as] the rule and
the measure" of every teaching, whether theological or philosophical, that does not seem to have prevented her at all from
invoking philosophical methods of proof and demonstration.
Such were the methods at work in her picture of the cosmos: "We
see all this with the piercing eyes of mind, nor can we fail to be
taught through such a spectacle that a divine power, working
with techne and sophia, is manifesting itself in this actual world
and, penetrating each portion, combines these portions with the
whole and completes the whole by the portions and encompasses
the universe with a single all-controlling force, self-possessed and
self-contained, never ceasing from its motion, yet never altering
the position that it holds." Thus it was in accordance with both
natural and revealed authority that she formulated her doctrine
of creation on the basis of all things, whether visible or invisible.
Macrina's vision of "all things" as a whole and in constituent
portionswhich seemed to be accessible, by her interpretation,
within the confines also of natural theologywas basic as well to
revealed theology, for which the statements of the Scriptures
identifying Christ as "the righteousness of God" became the
ground for the affirmation: "Whether you look at the cosmos as a
whole or at the parts of the world that make up that complete
whole, all these are works of the Father." And because it was
impossible for "all created nature . . . to hold together without
the care and providence of God," it was Christ, "the Creator
Logos, the only-begotten God," who distributed his "mercies
-35*-
Bas.Spir.8.19
(SC 17:312-)
See pp.17782
Gr.NyssJtt/awt.
(Jaeger 3-IL71)
Gr.Nyss.wM. 1.402
(Jaeger 1:143-44)
Bas.Hex.1.2
(SC 26:148)
Gr.Nyss.Or.cafecfc.39.6
(Meridier 188)
Bas.Hex.8.7
(SC 26:470)
Unterstein 1903,4547
See pp. 15 2 - 6 5
Gr.Nyss. Or.catecb.$.$
(Meridier 26)
Jaki 1978,39
C o s m o s as Contingent Creation
Jaki 1978,278
Grant 1952,210-11
Gr.Naz.Or.8.16I8;I8.36
(PG35:8o8-i2;i033)
Gr.Naz.Or.43.55
(PG 36:544)
Gr.Nyss. V.Macr.
(Jaeger 8-1:413-14)
Gr.Nyss.Or.catecfe.13.1
{Meridier 74)
Gr.Nyss..2.228-32
(Jaeger 1:292-93)
Gn 1:5
Bas.Hex.4.2
(SC 26:250)
Gr.Nyss.Ewrc.2.549
(Jaeger 1:386)
Gr.Nyss. Horn. opif. 1
(PG 44:128)
2-57
~^$w
Gr.Nyss.fim.1.383
(Jaeger r:i39)
Hcb 11:3
Gr.Nyss.EMH.3.7.5
(Jaeger 1:216-17)
Gr.Nyss.EwM.2.435
(Jaeger 1:353-54)
Gr.Nyss.EH.3.2.123-24
(Jaeger 1:92-93)
Gr.Nyss.Hex.
(PG 44:104)
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:124)
Col 1:17
Gr.Nyss.Or.catech.6.4
(Meridier 36)
Eph 3:18
Ladner r955,88-95
Gr.Nyss. Eun. 3.3.40
(Jaeger 2:i2r22)
Aug.Tn'n.i.6.r2
(CCSL 50:41)
Rom 11:36
Edsmann 1939,11-44
N a t u r a l Theology as Presupposition
C o s m o s as Contingent Creatipn
Bas.Sp/r.5.7
(SC 171x74-76)
Bas.Sp/r.8.19
(5017:312)
Gr.Nyss.Hom.opif.i
(PG 44:129)
Symb.Nic.-CP
(Alberigo-Jcdin 24)
Danielou 1944,15282
Eun.ap.Gr.Nyss.Ewtt.
3-9-54 (Jaeger 2:284)
Peterson 1964
Mt 18:10
Bas.Ewn.3.1
(SC 305:148)
Gr.Naz.O.13.4
(PG 35:856)
Gr.Nyss.Th'K.7
(Jaeger 3-1:12)
Bas.Spzr.16.38
(SC 17:384)
Mt 22:30
Gr.Nyss.Wrg.4
(Jaeger 8-1:277)
Gr.Nyss. V.Macr.
(Jaeger 8-1:382)
259
him' all things are turned, looking with irresistible and ineffable
affection to the author and maintainer of their life." Created
nature could not hold together without the Creator Logos, who
distributed his mercies to all creatures. And "all creatures" meant
nothing less than all creatures: "The earth is stable without being
immutable, while the heaven, on the contrary, as it has no mutability, so it has no stability either. Thus the divine power, by
interweaving change in the stable nature and interweaving motion with that which is not subject to change, can, by the interchange of attributes, at once join them both closely to each
otherand at the same time make both of them alien from the
conception of deity." It was this distinction between "earth" as
the visible creation and "heaven" as the invisible creation, but
much more importantly the ontological distinction between both
of them and "deity," that the creed expressed in its opening
words: "We believe in one God, Father, all-sovereign Maker of
heaven and earth, of all things, whether visible or invisible."
By making it explicit that the Maker of heaven and earth was
the Creator of "all things," a phrase that included "the invisible
things" and not only "the visible things," the orthodox creed,
and all the Cappadocians as its defenders, addressed the decisive
instance of their teaching that the cosmos was a contingent creation: the doctrine of angels. In keeping with their rejection of
any suggestion that precise formulations were to be regarded as
more important in the Christian religion than worship, the Cappadocians constantly emphasized, even in their most polemical
and their most speculative works, the specifically religious content also of this doctrine. Thus it was in a polemical writing
against Eunomius that Basil issued a reminder of the idea of the
guardian angel, that there was "an angel accompanying each
individual among the faithful." There was a close association
between the angels and the Holy Spirit. A bishop was to look
upon his congregation as "handed over to you by the Holy Spirit
and presented to you by the angels." The holiness of the angels,
too, was a gift from the Holy Spirit. It was the Holy Spirit who
conferred on them "the grace flowing for the completion and
perfection of their hypostasis." For human morality, therefore,
the doctrine of angels furnished a model and guide for ascetic
discipline, a discipline defined as "the tecbne in the science of the
more divine life, teaching those still living in the body to achieve
an approximation of that noncorporeal life." That ascetic way of
life served as an "imitation of the angelic life," as Macrina lived it.
The angels were a reminder of the religious imperative to obey the
Gr.Nyss.KM.2.391
(Jaeger 1:340)
Jni:i8
Gr.Nyss. V.Mos. 2.
(Jaeger 7-1:87)
Gr.Naz.O.29.8
(SC 250:192)
Col 1:16
Phil 2:10
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:69)
Gr.Naz.Or.28.31
(SC 250:170)
Bas.Het.2.3
(SC 26:148)
Bas.spir.16.38
(SC 17:376)
C o s m o s as Contingent Creation
Werner 1941,30249
Is 9:5
See pp.267-69
Gr.Nyss.Ewtt.3-9.39
(Jaeger 2:278)
Gr.Nyss.Ewrt. 1.27071
(Jaeger 1:105-6)
Gr.Nyss.EM/1.2.67-69
(Jaeger 1:245-46)
Lovejoy 1936,2466
Gr.Naz.Or.38.10
(PG 36:321)
Bas.Ep.189.7
(Courtonne 2:139)
Mareo-SecoBastero
1988,353-79
261
Christ and in Christ and that therefore the angels were part of the
contingent creation rather than of the divine reality had it as one
of its trinitarian points to refute the effort of an Arian "angel
christology" to classify Christ as an angel. When Isaiah, in his
prophecy of the incarnation and nativity of Christ, gave him the
title of "angel of mighty counsel [megales boules angelos]," this
term was "an indication, in clear and uncontrovertible terms, of
the economy of his humanity," rather than of the divine nature
that he shared with the Father and the Holy Spirit in the Trinity.
But although that distinction between economy and theology
may have been the primary, or certainly the most crucial, implication of this confession, the Cappadocians were likewise concerned, and ultimately for the same reason, to get the metaphysics straight. Later in the same work in whose first book he
postulated the thesis of "the ultimate division of all being into the
intelligible realities" (including both God and the angels) and the
"empirical realities," Gregory of Nyssa was prepared to refine
that thesis in a fundamental way by declaring, even concerning
the angels with their "pure naked intelligence": "If we weigh
even their comprehension with the majesty of the one who really
is, it may be that if anyone should venture to say that even their
power of understanding is not far superior to our own weakness,
that conjecture would fall within the limits of probability. For
wide and insurmountable is the intervening barrier that divides
and fences off the uncreated nature from the created ousia."
There he was going far beyond what he had called "the ultimate
division" of reality, to that division of reality which truly was
ultimate, the division between "the uncreated nature" and "the
created ousia"; and the doctrine of angels, by unequivocally locating them in the latter category and thereby defining their being
as part of the contingent creation, made a major contribution to
that clarification of the issue.
The natural theology of the Cappadocians could sometimes
lead them to a doctrine of the great chain of being: "Akin to deity
are those natures that are intellectual and only to be comprehended by mind; but all those of which the senses can take cognizance are utterly alien to deity, and of these the furthest removed
are all those that are entirely destitute of soul and of power of
motion." Not only divine revelation, but "the plain testimony of
the evidence in human life," supported the thesis that "the divine
economy beyond us," the world of angels and of the Platonic
forms, was "governed by the Spirit." But a deeper contemplation
of the world of angels, as such contemplation was informed by
262
KT ,
Gr.Naz.Or.6.13
(PG 35:740)
M d
(Jaeger 3-1:109)
1 Cor 12:6
GrN
.,
.,
(jt.Nyss.Hex.
(PG 44:92)
Bas.ffeK.1.7
u II4 J
(SC 26:270)
{sc 26:238-40)
..
Gr.Naz.Or.29.21
(sc 250:224)
CHAPTER
17
Cjr.Nyss.GtfMf.7
(Jaeger 6:234)
Gr N ss Or cat b
(Meridier nz)
t .
Crr.Nyss.Or.cdtecw.5.1
(Meridier 2.2)
n XT
in time and history was "the true hed of the universe." Even as
they presented their doctrine of the creation, they were pointing
toward their presentation of the doctrine of the incarnation:
"That the omnipotent nature was capable of descending to man's
lowly position is a clearer evidence of power than are great and
supernatural miracles. For it somehow accords with God's nature, and is consistent with it, to do great and sublime things by
divine power. It does not startle us to hear it said that the whole
creation, including the invisible world, exists by God's power,
and is the realization of God's will. But descent to man's lowly
position is a supreme example of powerof a power that is not
bounded by circumstances that are contrary to its nature." In
their doctrine of the Trinity, similarly, they were conscious of
being able to assume that Judaism on the basis of its revealed
knowledge in the Scriptures, together with Hellenism on the
basis of its natural knowledge in "innate ideas," would both
assent, in some sense and to some measure, to the thesis that God
had both a Logos and a "Spirit"; where that assent broke off for
both Hellenism and Judaism was at the point of "the economy by
which the Logos of God became man, as something unbelievable
^
'
rwa^
Gr.Nyss.w. 3.3.51
(Jaeger 1:12.5-26)
See pp.259-62
Rousse 1965,14752
Bas.Ep.125.2
(Courtonne 2:32)
Heb 11:1
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:96)
Rom 1:20
Bas.Hex.1.6
{SC 26:110)
Gr.Naz.Or.29.19
(SC 250:216)
Bar 3:38
Col 2:9
Gr.Nyss.Ctfttr.13
(Jaeger 6:390-91)
Gr.Nyss.Or.catech.zq.i
(Meridier 112-14)
N a t u r a l Theology as Presupposition
became incarnate by "taking to himself humanity in its completeness," a truth that was knowable by divine revelation alone.
Similarly, the doctrine of angels was a component not only of
their cosmology but of their doctrine of economy.
Within the schema of the Cappadocian system as within the
sequence of the Nicene Creed, therefore, the doctrine of the incarnation occupied a special dialectical position in relation to all
that had preceded it. By opening with the declaration, "We believe [pisteuomen]," the creed as quoted by the Cappadocians
can be said to have identified everything that followed, including
that which was knowable also to natural theology, as the object of
faith. The New Testament's most specific definition of faith described it as "the evidence of things not seen." Therefore, according to Basil, "The mind is led by the sight of things that are visible
and empirically perceptible to the contemplation of things that
are invisible." Yet what followed now in the Nicene Creed would
seem to be the very opposite; for by the incarnation the mind was
actually led from the contemplation of invisible things back to the
utterly visible and empirically perceptible, from spirit back to
flesh, and from the timelessly transcendent back to the historically immanent. A mind that was quite willing to speak apophatically about God as "that incomprehensible, inconceivable,
and ineffable reality, transcending all glory of greatness," now
found itself "staggered" by the incarnation; and it balked at the
very idea. It had been characteristic of God already under the Old
Testament economy to work paradoxically. Although the incarnation was the supreme instance of "that with which God wills to
enlighten someone by speaking in person and without enigmas,"
the paradox was in fact heightened, not resolved, in the New
Testament revelation. Its title "Christ," in accordance with that
paradox, did not "pertain to the eternity of the Godhead, but to
the human being who received God [pros ton theodochon anthropon], the one who was seen here on earth and who [as the
Old Testament said] 'associated with human beings'"; and it was
about this "man who received God" that the New Testament in
turn affirmed, "It is in Christ that the Godhead in all its fullness
dwells embodied"as though, in the striking phrase of Gregory
of Nyssa, a flame were to be pointing downward rather than
upward.
To cope with this paradox reverently without attempting
to resolve it rationalistically, the tradition of Greek Christian
thought, which also used the word in its more general, usual
T h e E c o n o m y of Salvation
Lampe 6Z7-2.8
Lampe 94043
Symb.Nic.
(Alberigo-Jedin 5);
Symb.Nic.-CP
(ASberigo-Jedin 24)
Is 22:19,2i;Lk 16:2,3,4;
1 Cor 9:i7;Eph 1:10,3:2,
3:9;Col 1:25;! Tm 1:4
Gr.Presb.V.Gr.Naz.
(PG 35:188)
Gottwald 1906,22-23
Gr.Naz.Or.30.18-19
(SC 250:262-66)
Gr.Nyss. V.Macr.
(Jaeger 8-1:390)
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:165)
265
u N
^, g _.
f Jaeger 2.12.9) ..:'
Acts 1:36
;,
. , .
ap.Ath.j4r.i.i3
(PG 26.173)
, , .
(PG 26:172)
(SC 305:16)
Phil 2:7
r, ..
j.
Cr.Nyss.cHM.3.3.12.
(Jaeger 2:111)
N
(jaeger 1:209)
economy."
As "the one who is [on]," the Son of God was eternal, superior
to all marks of time. But expounding "the mystery of our faith" in
the course of his Life of Moses, Gregory of Nyssa formulated the
meaning of the incarnation this way: "He is, alone among all, the
only one who both had being before all the aeons and who began
to be in this final aeon.. . . He whose being extends back before
all times and before all the aeons entered this world of temporal
The E c o n o m y of Salvation
Gr.Nyss. V.Mos.z
(jaeger 7-1:91-91)
Gr.Nyss.Apoll.
(Jaeger 3-1:224)
Bas.Het.6.2
(SC 26:332)
Gr.Nyss.ff-3.7.3o
(Jaeger 2:215)
Gr.Nyss. Or.dom. 1
(PG 44:112425)
Rom 5:17
Bas.5piV.14.31
(SC 17:356)
1 Cor 15:22
Gr.Nyss. Hom.opif.2.3
(PG 44:209)
Gr.Nyss.Or.catech.z7.!
(Meridier 126)
Gr.Nyss.Or.catecfr.9.1
(Meridier 64)
Gr.Nyss. Cant.13
(Jaeger 6:380)
Danielou r95r,85
Gr.Naz.Or.r.i
(SC 247:72)
Gr.Naz.Or.45
(PG 36:645-64)
Gr.Naz.Or.38
(PG 36:312-33)
267
becoming for our sakes, in order to lead that which existed outside the realm of being back into being." A characteristic common to the economy of creation and to the economy of salvation
was that they both took place "not before all the aeons, but just
once [hapax]," within time and history. It was the pattern of the
divine economy, as was evident already from the economy of
creation, that it was the way for God to have "planted into history
everywhere, in mystic language, the dogma of theology."" That
became true above all in the case of the economy of salvation. As
Nyssen said in his Catechical Oration, "God's transcendent
power is not so much displayed in the vastness of the heavens or in
the luster of the stars or in the orderly arrangement of the universe or in the perpetual supervision of it, as it is rather to be seen
in the condescension of God to our weak nature." This economy
of salvation, too, took place within time, which extended between precise and fixed limits, a beginning and an end. Because
time was concurrent with all things that were produced in creation, it was necessary that the eternal Son of God, who was its
Creator, himself be outside time. Yet, his incarnation had to take
place within time, which was divided into past, present, and
future.
In the first Adam, who was the product of the economy of
creation, "death established its reign," being "transmitted until
the end in a sequence of succession"; thus, all died in Adam, as
Paul had also said. The beginning of time necessarily implied the
end of time as well. The economy of salvation in Christ, the
second Adam, had to reach both of those points, by "touching
the arche and extending to the telos and covering everything
between" the arche and the telos of human life. What lay between his human arche and his human telos was "the human
birth, the advance from infancy to manhood, the eating and
drinking, the weariness, the sleep, the grief, the tears, the false
accusations, the trial, the cross, the death, and the burial in the
tomb" of Jesus Christ, as these events of the economy were narrated in the Gospels. At each of these stages, "in accordance with
the economy he underwent on our behalf, he was conformed to
the body of our low estate." As each of these events in the life of
Christ came up on the calendar of the church year, it could become the subject of homilies and exhortations. For example, the
first of the orations of Gregory of Nazianzus opened with the
words, "It is Easter Day [Anastase<jshemera]!"; and the last was
likewise delivered on Easter Day. Moreover, his "Oration on the
Theophany," delivered in 380 or 381, seems to be the earliest
~^sw
Usener 1911,26073
Bas.rlp.99
(Courtonne i-.xi4-i8)
Gr.Naz.Or.21
(SC 270:110-92);
Gr.Naz.Or.43
(PG 36:493-605)
List 1928,2431
Musurillo 1957,370-75
Gr.Nyss. V.Macr.
(Jaeger 8-1:370-414)
Gr.Nyss. V.Mos.
(Jaeger 7-1:1-145)
Lk 2:52
Gr.Nyss. Cant.15
(Jaeger 6:467)
Gr.Nyss.Hom.opif.zz
(PG 44:205)
Gr.Nyss. V.Mos.2
(Jaeger 7-1:82)
Gr.Nyss.Cdf.3
(Jaeger 6:96)
Jn 20:17
~Natural
Theology as Presupposition
The E c o n o m y of Salvation
Gr.Naz.O.30.8
{SC 150:140-42)
1 Cor i:24;Jn 1:4
Gr.Nyss.Apo//.
(Jaeger 3-1:219)
Jn io:7;Ps 117:22;
Mt 3:10
Gr.Nyss.EMW-2.298
(Jaeger 1:314)
Kelly 1958,26!
Bas.EMM.2.22
(SC 305:88)
Bas.fsp.223.3
(Courtonne 3:1113)
Z69
result that in both cases the reverse of what does or does not
properly apply to us holds good of him. In the strict [trinitarian]
sense of the term, God is our 'God' but not our 'Father.' What
leads heretics astray is the coupling together of titles, titles which,
because of the intermingling, overlap. This means that when the
natures are distinguished, the titles are differentiated along with
the ideas." The Christ who, within economy, had "appeared in
these last days in the flesh" was the one, within theology, to
whom such titles as "the power and wisdom of God, the light and
the life" all applied. The incarnate one also had, within economy,
other titles, such as "door, stone, axe," and the like. But Gregory
of Nyssa explained: "None of these names represents the nature
of the only-begotten one or his deity or the peculiar character of
his essence. Nevertheless he is called by these names, and each
appellation has its own special appropriateness." He continued:
"As our Lord provided for human life in various forms, each
variety of his beneficence is suitably distinguished by his several
names."
Likewise, in a passage that J. N . D. Kelly has described as "a
highly original theory of doctrinal development," Gregory of
Nazianzus explicitly invoked the distinction between economy
and theology to speculate no less boldly, by applying these
christological principlesgrowth [auxesis], progress [prokope],
sequence [akolouthia], and historical order [taxis]to the history of Christian doctrine itself, in fact, to the very history of what
Basil identified as the "chief dogma," the dogma of the Trinity,
the unchangeable doctrine about the unchangeable divine nature. Basil spoke of a doctrinal "development [prokope]" in himself from childhood to manhood, preserving continuity and identity and "not changing in kind though gradually being perfected
in growth." But Nazianzen projected the development from the
individual to the history of salvation: "[Under the Old Testament
economy, development came through the subtraction of legal
regulations, one by one.] But in the case of theology. . . maturity
is reached by additions. For the matter stands thus. The Old
Testament proclaimed the Father openly, and the Son more obscurely. The New [Testament] manifested the Son, and suggested
the deity of the Spirit. N o w [that is, after the New Testament] the
Spirit Itself dwells among us, and supplies us with a clearer demonstration of Itself. For it was not safe, when the deity of the
Father was not yet acknowledged, plainly to proclaim the Son;
nor, when that of the Son was not yet received, to burden us
further (if I may use so bold an expression) with the Holy Spirit.
2.70
2 Cor 3:18
Gr.Naz.Or.31.z526
(SC 2.50:324-26)
Gr.Naz.Or.4.110
(SC 309:264)
Florovsky 7:136
Gr.Nyss.Ewn. 1.341
(Jaeger 1:128)
Gr.Nyss.Apoll.
(Jaeger 3-1:134)
Bas.Spir.8.18
(SC 17:308)
Gr.Naz.Or.28
(SC 250:118)
N a t u r a l Theology as Presupposition
T h e E c o n o m y of Salvation
Gr.Nyss.Or.catecfo.pr.z
(Meridier 2)
Gr.Nyss.Or.catecfc.9.1
(Meridier 64)
Gr.Nyss.Or.catech.io.)
(Meridier 68)
ap.Bas.EMM.1.27
(SC 299:266)
Gr.Nyss.Or.atfec/j.25.1
(Meridier 118)
Florovsky 3:16370
Gr.Nyss.Apo/i.
(Jaeger 3-1:217)
Bar 3:38
1 T m 3:16
271
chetical Oration (despite a title that seemed to be aimed at catechumens within the Christian community, whatever their age),
Gregory of Nyssa was in fact presenting apologetics at least as
much as dogmatics, as he made clear at the outset when he cataloged what he saw as his potential audience: the adherent of the
Jewish faith, the one reared in Hellenism, the Anomoean, the
Manichean, the followers of Marcion, Valentinus, and Basilides,
"and the rest on the list of those astray in heresy." Even there,
however, he drew the line sharply and unequivocally between his
presentation of creation and the fall, which had preceded and in
which he had stated his case also according to the criteria of
natural theology, and his presentation of the incarnation and its
implications, which followed and which relied almost exclusively
on the authority of revelation: "Up to this point, perhaps, one
who has followed the course of our argument will agree with it,
inasmuch as we do not appear to have said anything unbefitting a
proper conception of deity [exo ti tes theoprepous ennoias]. But
towards what follows and constitutes the strongest part of this
revelation of truth, he will not take a similar view." Although he
was quite willing to go on to refer to the relation between body
and soul as an "understandable example, in order to form some
sort of proper conception of the divine economy," he was definitely not "proving" the doctrine of the economy of salvation and
the incarnation by this. Rather, what he and the other Cappadocians were arguing was that a properly formulated natural theology about divine transcendence, far from leading necessarily to
the heterodox doctrine of the Trinity, as Eunomius and his adherents were alleging, was at any rate compatible with Nicene orthodoxy, including its doctrine of the divine economy of salvation.
Because, therefore, there could not be a contradiction between
a sound natural theology and the revealed theology and economy, the perennial Christian question "Cur deus homo?" formulated by Anselm of Canterbury in his treatise of 109798, could
receive a special answer in Cappadocian dogmatics. As was so
often the case, it took the challenges of heresy to evoke a summary statement of that answer: "He appeared on earth and 'associated with human beings,' so that human beings might no longer
have opinions according to their own notions about the selfexistent one, formulating into a doctrine the hints that had come
to them from vain conjectures; but so that we might rather be
convinced that truly 'God has been manifested in flesh'. . . and
that we might receive the teaching concerning the transcendent
272.
N a t u r a l Theology as Presupposition
i Cor 13:12
nature of the Deity that is given to us, as it were, 'in a mirror' from
the older Scriptures . . . as an evidence of the truth fully revealed
to us." At the center of this economy of salvation was "the banner
of the cross." In the course of their treatment of the economy of
the crossthis "marvelously constructed drama dealing with
us"the Cappadocians could invoke many of the metaphors for
the atonement from the great variety in the history of Christian
thought. Sometimes they spoke, as Gregory of Nyssa did in his
exposition of the Song of Songs, as though the purpose of the
incarnation and atonement were to instruct humanity. Again, as
Gregory spoke elsewhere in the same commentary, the atonement had it as its purpose to evoke from believers an imitation of
Christ's offering of himself, as for example in Paul's willingness to
become "an outcast" for the sake of his people just as Christ had
been.
The long-standing Patristic imagery of the cross as a giant
"fishhook" on which the devil was impaled after being deceived
by the bait of the humanity of Christ also found an echo in
Cappadocian thought. "In order to secure that the ransom on
our behalf might be easily accepted by him who required it,"
Gregory of Nyssa wrote, "the deity was hidden under the veil of
our nature, that so, as with ravenous fish, the hook of the deity
might be gulped down along with the bait of flesh." But for
Gregory of Nazianzus, by contrast, "The full significance of the
Crucifixion is not expressed by the concepts of sacrifice and retribution alone." In his first Easter oration he, too, said that Christ
"gave himself a ransom and a reconciliation for us [lytron hyper
hemonkai antallagma]," both "lytron" and "antallagma" being
terms employed by Christ himself, as reported in the Greek of the
Gospel of Matthew. But in a later and more mature Easter oration, which was also the final oration of the forty-five, he rejected
as an "outrage [hybris]" any suggestion that the ransom of the
death of Christ had been offered to the devil. He explained that
the situation was quite the opposite: "The Father accepts him,
but neither asked for him nor demanded him; but it was on
account of the incarnation, and because humanity must be sanctified by the humanity of God, that he might deliver us himself,
and overcome the tyrant." It would appear that here Gregory of
Nazianzus was invoking a presupposition about the doctrine of
God that he shared with Gregory of Nyssa, but that he was
drawing from it a divergent conclusion about the atonement; for,
again drawing on Florovsky's discussion of Nyssen, "This doctrine [of ransom to the devil] is incompatible with the rest of
Gr.Nyss.Re^.2
(Jaeger 2:312-13)
Gr.Naz.Or.4.66
(50309:174)
Ladner 1955,88-95
Gr.Naz.Or.30.6
(SC 250:236)
Aulen 1969; Dunstone
1964
Gr.Nyss.Gmt.8
(Jaeger 6:252)
Rom 9:3
Gr.Nyss.Gmt.15
(Jaeger 6:443)
Aulen 1969,51-55
Gr.Nyss.Or.ctftec^.24.4
(Meridier 114)
Florovsky 7:143
Gr.Naz.Or.1.5
(SC 247:78)
Mt 20:28:16:26
Gr.Naz.Or.45.22
(PG 36:653)
T h e E c o n o m y of Salvation
Florovsky 7:195
Florovsky 3:99103
Heb 7:25
Gr.Naz.Or.30.14
(SC 250:256)
Gr.Nyss.Or.catecfc.15
(Meridier 78-82)
Bas.%>.8.i8
(SC 17:308)
Gr.Naz.Or.6.12
(PC 35:737)
Mt 27:46;Ps 21:2
Gr.Nyss.j4poft.24
(Jaeger 3-l:i68)
Bas.Ep.261.3
(Courtonne 3:117)
Gr.Nyss.EwK.3.3.31
(Jaeger 2:118-19)
Eun.ap.Gr.Nyss.Ewr/.
3-4-5 (Jaeger 2:135)
Eun.ap.Gr.Nyss.Ewn.
3.3.38 (Jaeger 1:120-21)
2-73
Gr.Nyss.ww.2.5o
(Jaeger 1:140)
Gr.Nyss.Or.catech.1.1
(Meridiec 8)
Gr.Naz.Or.z5.17
(SC 184:198)
Acts 2:36
Gr.Nyss. Eun. 3.4.62
(Jaeger 2:158)
Gr.Nyss.Re/^
(Jaeger 2:315)
Grillmeier 1965,278
Grillmeier 1958,
See p. 21
T h e E c o n o m y of Salvation
Gr.Nyss.EK.2.50
(Jaeger i:z4o)
Mai 3:6
Bas.Ep.z62.2.
(Courtonne 2:120)
4 Cor 5:19
See pp.22425
Gr.Nyss.Eww. 3.4.5
(Jaeger 2:135)
Gr.Nyss.Apolt.
(Jaeger 3-1:223)
ap.Bas.Ep.261.3
(Courtonne 3:117)
Gr.Nyss.Etttt.3.3.31
(Jaeger 2:11819)
2.75
Gr.Nyss.Fid.
(Jaeger 3-1:63)
Grillmeier-Bacht 1951
54. 1:389-418
CChalc.D*?/.
(Alberigo-Jedin 86-87)
Jn 11:1-44
Gr.Nyss.ijKK.3.3.65
(Jaeger z: 130-31)
Jn 10:17
Gr.Nyss.EwM.3.10.17
(Jaeger 1:195-96)
Stephan 1938
Gr.Nyss.Ref.143
(Jaeger 1:374)
1 Tm 1:5
Gr.Nyss.Apo//.
(Jaeger 3-1:133)
Gr.Nyss.ApoW.
(Jaeger 3-1:136)
Gr.Nyss.CtfKf.13
(Jaeger 6:381)
T h e E c o n o m y of Salvation
Gr.Naz.Or.29.19
(SC 250:216)
Wiles 1968,4756
Gr.Naz.Ep.101
(PG 37:181)
Draseke 189213,473512;
Lietzmann 1904,33-36,
67-75;Hiibner 1974,
12942;Grillmeier
1965,220-33
Gr.Nyss.Apoll.
(Jaeger 3-1:207)
Gr.Nyss.Re/'.i39
(Jaeger 2:372)
Jn 10:18
Gr.Nyss.EwK.3.4.43
(Jaeger 2:150)
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:136)
1 Cor 15:52-53
Gr.Nyss.Eww.3.3.51
(Jaeger 2:125-26)
277
not do away with the necessity for apophatic language theologically: there could be no authentic economy without authentic
theology, and an authentic theology was apophatic.
The basic presupposition of the economy of salvation at work
in the doctrine of the two natures in Christ was succinctly formulated by Gregory of Nazianzus but common to all the Cappadocians: "He remained what he was; what he was not, he
assumed." From this presupposition followed another of his succinct axioms: "What has not been assumed in incarnation has
not been cured in salvation [to aproslepton atherapeuton]." The
full implications of this axiom, particularly as it affected the human nature, were not worked out by the Cappadocians, in part
because they were facing only the beginnings of the controversy
over the question. Yet they did touch on many of the salient
points, especially in confronting what they, justly or not, took to
be the teaching of Apollinarianism, that in the incarnation the
divine Logos had taken the place of the human mind in Jesus
Christ. The threefold content of the doctrine of the creation of
humanity in the image of God also summarized for the Cappadocians what the Logos had assumed in incarnation, and therefore
likewise what the Logos had healed in salvation: rationality, free
will, and immortality. One consequence of the Apollinarist negation of a human mind in the incarnate Logos, as the Cappadocians interpreted it, would have been a denial of free will in him,
and consequently a denial that of all things, the human will,
which needed it most, had found a cure and restoration through
him. For that restoration depended on the human free will of the
incarnate Logos, who said of himself that he was laying down his
life of his own free will. The third component of the image of
God, immortality, likewise had to be part of the human nature of
Christ, which was "transformed by the commixture [with the
Logos] into that which it was not by nature." Thus, in a passage
of the New Testament to which Macrina alluded, "We shall be
changed, for this perishable body must be clothed with the imperishable, and what is mortal with immortality." For this to
happen, it was necessary that the Logos, who "by his own agency
drew the human nature up once more to immortal life," must
have "taken to himself humanity in completeness" through the
incarnation.
But because the Greek word logos was the technical term both
for "rationality" and for "the Word of God," as the Cappadocians argued in their play on words with the term, the definition
of the image of God as rationality was at one and the same time
278
Ps 39:6
Gr.Nyss.E.2..Z3 5
(Jaeger 1:294-95)
Jn 1:1
Gr.Nyss.EwM.3.6.40
(Jaeger 2:200)
Gr.Nyss.Re/. 5 8
(Jaeger 2:335)
Jn 1:14
Heb 4:15
Srawley 1906,43441
Gr.Nyss.Re/:i72-8i
(Jaeger 2:384-89)
Gr.Naz.p.ioi
(PG 37:181)
Gr.Nyss.Apo//.
(Jaeger 3-1:145)
Gr.Nyss.Or.catech.9.1
(Meridier 64)
Jo.D.Trans.
(PG 96:545-76)
Mt 17:19;Mk 9:210;
Lk 9:28-3652 Pt 1:16-18
Gr.Nyss.EMK.2.247
(Jaeger 1:298)
1 Tm 2:4
Mt 17:2
Gr.Naz.Or.29.19
(SC 250:218)
N a t u r a l Theology as Presupposition
the most obvious and most problematical of the three components of the image in relation to the doctrine of the incarnation of
the Logos or Word of God, and it set the basis for the other two.
The Cappadocians insisted that the human logos was "as nothing
in comparison" with the divine Logos. Therefore, the evangelist
John took special pains to dissociate his language about the divine Logos from "the common understanding of logos.'" Yet in
some respects there was nevertheless an analogy between them;
"the generation of the human logos from the human mind without division" corresponded in some respects to the generation of
the divine Logos. The central text for the doctrine of the incarnation, "The Word became flesh [ho logos sarx egeneto]," all too
easily provided the basis for a confusion between these two
meanings of logos. It was a confusion that Gregory of Nyssa
claimed to find implied in the thought of Eunomius, and against
it he championed the teaching: "The man of God is complete,
united to the deity in body and in soul, so that he 'who has been
tested in every way, only without sinning' left no part of our
nature that he did not take upon himself. The soul is not sin."
When Apollinaris, justly or unjustly, was charged with a similar
confusion, that was what evoked from Gregory of Nazianzus the
axiom quoted earlier about the incarnation, whose full formulation read, in opposition to Apollinarism: "Anyone who trusts in
him as a man without a human mind is really bereft of mind and
quite unworthy of salvation. For that which he has not assumed
he has not cured, but that which is united to his deity is also
saved." By a corollary, therefore, just as "no one bereft of mind"
was capable of grasping the faith in the incarnate one, so the
incarnate one could not be bereft of mind.
This dimension of the economy of salvation was visible
throughout the earthly life of Jesus Christ, at each step of the way
in the Gospel narrative. But for the Cappadocians, as for the
Greek Christian tradition generally, the event that had comprehended it in a special way was the transfiguration or metamorphosis of the human nature of Christ on Mount Tabor. At the
transfiguration, as Gregory of Nyssa expounded it, "there came a
voice from heaven," from the God of whom the apostle Paul said,
"It is his will that all should find salvation and come to know the
truth." And it was there, on the mount, that he shone forth,
"becoming more luminous than the sun," to act, in the words of
Gregory of Nazianzus, "as our mystagogical guide to the future
[epi tou orous astraptei, kai heliou photoeidesteros ginetai, to
mellon mystagogon]." That future, which was the content of his
Tyciak 1961,93-97
"mystagogy" and the outcome of the entire economy of salvation, was nothing less than the very transfiguration or metamorphosis of human natut e . The image of God as rationality, the
image of God as free will, a.nd the image of God as immortality
each was, for the Cappadocians, a necessary and inescapable
corollary of natural theology; and denying any of these was not
only a contradiction of th e explicit teaching of divine revelation
but a contravention of human reason or logos. At the same time,
however, when they took up the metamorphosis of human nature
as the gift and blessing of the incarnation of the divine Logos, the
Cappadocians celebrated the restoration of these qualities
through the incarnation and through the economy of salvation,
as a miracle transcending not merely human achievement but
human comprehension.
CHAPTER
18
Symb.Nic.-CP
(Alberigo-Jedin 24)
Danielou 1953,15470
Seepp.131-34
JaniniCuesta 1946,51-52
Gr.Naz.Or.38.11
(PG 36:321-24)
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim. res. (PG 46:28)
When the Niceno-Constantinopolitan Creed articulated the eschatological hope of the church in the sentence, "We await the
resurrection of the dead [prosdokomen anastasin nekron]," the
relation between this expectation and the doctrine of the immortality of the soul in the theology of the Cappadocians was a
documentation of the complexity of the relations between the
various Classical and Christian definitions of the image of God.
The complexity made itself no less evident when they took it
upon themselves, without embarrassment or even without ascription, to appropriate the Classical definition of human nature
as a microcosm, which at least sometimes they seem to have felt
able to present as though it were nothing more nor less than a
doctrine of the orthodox church. And yet, when they did ascribe
that definition to some source, either they could praise it as a
doctrine maintained "among the wise [para ton sophon]," apparently intending this principally as a reference to the "wise"
among Classical philosophers, or, they could attack it as a doctrine that was "mean and unworthy of the majesty of human
nature" and as a "fancy of pagan writers who magnified human
nature, as they supposed, by a comparison of it to the world."
Their doctrine of the metamorphosis of humanity in Christ
likewise illustrated the complexity of the relation between natural theology and revealed theology in their systems. For in their
judgment whatever validity natural theology may have been able
to claim for its doctrine of the image of God was fatally flawed by
z8o
T h e M e t a m o r p h o s i s of H u m a n N a t u r e
Gr.Nyss.j4wim.re5.
(PG 46:116)
Winslow 1979
Gr.Naz.Or.40.3453 2
(PG 36:408:404)
Gr.Nyss.Cnr.2
(Jaeger 6:53)
McClear 1948,175111
Gr.Nyss. Or.dom. 5
(PG 44:1181)
See pp.41-49
Gr.Nyss. Virg. 10
(Jaeger 8-1:288)
Gr.Nyss.V.Mos.2
(Jaeger 7-1:116)
lir.Nyss.Or.iiom.2
(PG 44:1145)
Gross 1938,21950
its inability to encompass at one and the same time the several
contradictions of the human condition, what has been called
"the grandeur and the misery of man," neither of which could be
adequately discussed without the other, the misery as present
reality in human sin and the grandeur as future reality in the
prospect of theosis, a sharing in the very being and nature of God.
A person who was originally created in the image of God now
had to undergo baptism, in order to "scrape off the evil matter
and receive again the image whole." That metamorphosis was
called for because an honest assessment of the present human
state had to describe it as "disfigurement [metapoiesis]." So disfigured had human nature become and so appalling was its misery that the Cappadocians found it necessary, amid all their celebration of the grandeur of the image of God, to speak soberly
about nothing less than "the defacing of that image and the destruction 01 that divine impress [ho tes eikonos aphanismos kai
he lyme tou theiou charakteros] which had been formed in us
when we were first created." The transcendence of the divine
nature was so elevated that it defied expression in human words;
but "the greatness of that loss in falling away from the possession
of real goodness" was a tragedy that was also inexpressible, in
this case not because it was so glorious but because it was so
abject. Human nature, though destined for the heights of participation in the divine nature through theosis, had instead proven
itself capable of finding innumerable pathways downward. There
was, therefore, a demonic image corresponding to the divine
image and caricaturing it. "As there are obvious characteristics of
resemblance to God through which one may become a child of
God," Gregory of Nyssa explained, "so also there are certain
signs belonging to the evil character [tou ponerou charakteros
semeia], the bearer of which cannot be the child of God, because
of being stamped with the image of the contrary nature." The
features of this evil character were: "envy and hate, slander, conceit, cupidity, passionate lust, and mad ambition." As a consequence of the fall of man into sin, each of the three principal
components of the image of God enumerated earlierreason,
free will, and immortalitynow had its demonic counterpart in
this "image of the contrary nature."
Conversely, as a consequence of what had been accomplished
in the economy of salvation in the life, death, and resurrection of
Christ, each of those three components was also raised to an
infinitely higher power. For the language of all the Cappadocians
^ N a t u r a l t h e o l o g y as Presupposition
Florovsky 3:140
Bas.Ep.233.1
(Courtonne 3:39)
Gr.Nyss.V.Mos.2
(Jaeger 7-I:io8)
Gr.Nyss.lnfant.
(Jaeger 3-II:8o)
Gronau 1922,96109
Pl.Prr.361a
T h e M e t a m o r p h o s i s of H u m a n N a t u r e
Gr.Nyss.Eww.2.13 840
(Jaeger 1:165-66)
Gr.Nyss. Infant.
(Jaeger 3-11:93)
Gr.Nyss. Beat.z
(PG 44:1213)
Bas.ffec.2.5
(SC 26:160)
Gn 1:31;! Tm 4:4
Gr.Nyss. Virg. 1 2
(Jaeger 8-1:299)
Gr.Nyss. Eun. 1.92
(Jaeger 1:53)
Gr.Nyss. Or.dom. 5
(PG 44:1181)
Gr.Nyss.Or.dom.4
(PG 44:1164-65)
283
Gr.Nyss.V/rg.12
(Jaeger 8-1:197-9
Gr.Nyss.Be#f.3;5
(PG 44:i22.8;i257)
Gr.Nyss. V.Mos.z
(Jaeger 7-1:59)
Gr.Nyss.Anmi.res.
(PG 46:68)
Gr.Nyss. Eun. 3.6.77
(Jaeger 2:113)
Gr.Nyss. Anim.res.
(PG 46:13)
JaniniCuesta 1946,7375
2 Cor 4:16
Gr.Nyss. Virg.zo
(Jaeger 8-1:324-25)
Mossay 1966,27179
See pp.7981
Gr.Nyss.Cawti2
(Jaeger 6:350)
Gr.Nyss.KM.2.2034
(Jaeger 1:284)
T h e M e t a m o r p h o s i s of H u m a n N a t u r e
Gr.Nyss.EMM.3.2.5 4
(Jaeger 2:70)
Pelikan 1990,7172
Bas.Spir.9.23
(SC 17:326-18)
Gr.Nyss.B^f.3
(PG 44:11x5-28)
Gr.Nyss.Virg.12
(Jaeger 81:300)
Lk 15:2.1
Gr.Nyss. Or.dom. 2
(PG 44:1144-45)
Gr.Nyss. Ref,nz
(Jaeger 2:359)
Lovejoy 1955,277-95
Gr.Na2.Or.38.13
(PG 36:325)
285
z86
Gr.Nyss.Cant.T5
(Jaeger 6:458)
Gn i:z6
Gr.Nyss.Canr.15
(Jaeger 6:439)
Courtonne 1934,13136
N a t u r a l Theology as Presupposition
2,87
butes those qualities that belonged to the divine image and that
could be seen in the new humanity, but only after its metamorphosis through him. But on the other hand, Basil could also
speak of "coming back again to natural beauty, cleansing the
royal image, and restoring its ancient form." That reference to
"natural beauty [to ek physeos kallos]" would appear to provide
justification for filling the concept "image of God" after the
metamorphosis of humanity through the incarnate Logos with
those qualities that could be discerned, also by the limited resources of natural theology, as belonging to human nature as
such. These latter qualities have been summarized earlier under
the three headings: reason, free will, and immortality. Therefore,
See pp.2.77-79
. .
B
(5017:326-2.8)
See pp.127-35
1 Cor 15:13
The tension between the two paradigms was already discernible, at least according to many interpreters of the Pauline epistles, in the New Testament's treatment of the resurrection of
Christ. Sometimes the New Testament appeared to be presenting
the Easter event as one instance, the supreme instance but still
one instance, of the general and universal teaching of resurrection: "If there is no resurrection," the apostle Paul could reason
in writing to the Corinthians, "then Christ was not raised." This
tThes4:i 4
1 Tm 6:i6;zTm 1:10
.
.,
{PG 44:2.2,4)
288
N a t u r a l Theology as Presupposition
i Cor 15:20
Gr.Nyss.Re/-79
(Jaeger 2:344-45)
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:148)
Pl.Smp.193d
Malingrey 1961,212-13
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:108-9)
Z89
G N
(Jaeger 2:231-32.)
has died, yet employing either form of speech we equally represent by our terminology 'nonexistence.'"
In one sense, the doctrine of the resurrection also constituted
the difference distinguishing this hope from the general doctrine
of the immortality of the soul. Not only was the soul immortal
c N
same body again as before, composed of the same stoicheia, is
Anim.res. (PG 46:108-9) compacted around the soul." But even this formulation of the
divergence needed to be significantly qualified. For the Cappadocians took it to be demonstrable on purely naturalistic and scientific grounds, to "anyone examining our nature with careful attention, " that human existence did "not consist altogether in flux
and change," since a nature without any continuity at all would
be "altogether incomprehensible," and that therefore it was
GrN ssAo //
(Jaeger 3-1:178)
..
.,
(PG 44:225)
,-, .,
. .
Gr.Nyss. Anim.res.
(PG 46:141)
r, ..
(jaeger 2:303)
N
...
(Jaeger 3-1:161)
11
>
[Jesus Christ] in his human nature." It was primarily that economy carried out by the resurrection of Jesus Christ to which he
was referring when he declared: "The resurrection of this one
human being from death [he ek thanatou tou anthropou anastasis] is the destruction of death." For "the mystery of God's
economy with regard to death, and of the resurrection from the
z9
Gr.Nyss.Or.caiecfc.i6.9
(Meridier 90)
Gr.Nyss.Gmf.12.
(Jaeger 6:350-51)
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:108)
Gr.Nyss.V.Ater.
(Jaeger 8-1:395)
Gr.Naz.Or.24.17
(SC 284:76)
Mossay 1966
Gr.Nyss.Or.catecfc.35.7
(Meridier 164)
Schoemann 1943,4246
Dirking 1954,206
Gr.Naz.Or.14.25
(PG 35:892)
Gr.Naz.Or.45.18
(PG 36:648)
N a t u r a l Theology as Presupposition
dead" was that Christ, instead of "preventing the soul's separation from the body by death in accordance with the inevitable
course of nature," as he might have done in the exercise of his
sovereign and divine power, chose to die first himself and then to
bring soul and body together through his resurrection, thus becoming "the meeting point of both, of death and of life," indeed,
"restoring in himself the nature disrupted by death and becoming himself the principle for the reuniting of the separated
parts." Through the calamity of "death-dealing sin [he thanatopoios hamartia]," mortality and death had been mingled with
human nature itself and had been propagated by a deadly "succession [diadoche]" throughout human history. And so, although
Macrina's argumentation for the doctrine of the resurrection was
an attempt to find common ground with the philosophical doctrine of immortality, her own behavior in the face of death was a
negation of that common ground. Her brother Gregory reported,
with a note of awe: "That she did not even in her last breath find
anything strange in the hope of the resurrection, nor even shrink
at the departure from this lifeall this seemed to me more than
human." For, as Gregory of Nazianzus put it, the death of the
Christian was not really to be called a "departure" at all but
rather "a fulfillment, a loosing of bonds, or a relief from a great
burden."
Calamitous and destructive though it certainly was, death also
had a constructive purpose in the workings of divine providence.
In Nyssen's formulation, "It was this: to refashion human nature
once more by means of the resurrection into a sound creature,
apathes, pure, and with no admixture of evil, after this has been
eliminated by the dissolution of body and soul." In the death of
the body, passion died with it; but when the body was raised,
passion remained dead and life was free of it. As a constituent of
the metamorphosis of humanity, such an apatbeia was the counterpart to the freedom of the will as a constituent of the image of
God, and was in fact the means through which the will could
regain its freedom after sin. When God the Creator made human
nature, as Gregory of Nazianzus said in one of his orations,
"from the beginning free and self-determining [ap' arches . . .
eleutheron . . . kai autexousion]," that freedom and selfdetermination could be threatened by the conflict he described in
a later oration between "pleasure" and "the gift of reason,"
namely, of the reason by which it was possible to conquer pleasure and passion. When it remained unconquered and "unre-
T h e M e t a m o r p h o s i s of H u m a n N a t u r e
Gr.Nyss.EwM.3.1.31
(Jaeger 2:14)
Gr.Nyss.Or.cfom.4
(PG 44:1161)
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim. res. (PG 46:148)
Rom 6:11
Gal 2:2.0
Gr.Nyss.CflMr.15
(Jaeger 6:440)
OED 7-11:533-34
Gr.Naz.Or.20.9523.10
(SC 270:74;30o)
Gr.Nyss.Apoll.
(Jaeger 3-1:1365224)
Lit.Bus.
(Brightman 328)
Dirking 1954,202-12
Gal 3:28
Gr.Nyss.Hom.opif. 16
(PG 44:181)
Lk 20:34-36
Gr.Nyss.Virg.14
(Jaeger 8-1:309)
191
Z92.
Gr.Nyss. V.Macr.
(Jaeger 8-I: 3 8z)
Gr.Naz.O.8.8
(PG 35:797)
Gr.Nyss. V.Macr.
(Jaeger 8-1:375)
Armstrong 1948,121
Gr.Nyss. V/rg. 12
(Jaeger 8-1:297-98)
Gn 1:27
Gr.Naz.Or.38.13
(PG 36:325)
Gai'th 1953,54-58
Hiibner 1974,6774
Gr.Nyss.V;>j.i2
(Jaeger 8-1:297-98)
N a t u r a l Theology as Presupposition
Gr.Nyss.Hom.opif. 16
(PG 44:181)
Gr.Nyss. Beat, 2
(PG 44:1216)
See pp.25962
Gr.Nyss. Cant.z
(Jaeger 6:66)
293
2-94
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim. res. (PG 46:54)
'tesffey. i9?4;,i'iS*f 39
See pp.21920
Holl 1904
Bas.Sp*>.9.23
(SCI7.-J26-ZS)
Bas.Ep.233.1
(Courtonne 3:40)
See pp.200202
N a t u r a l Theology as Presupposition
Aubineau 1956,2.5-52.
Lampe 643-445649-50
..
Gr.NySS.CHK.3.3.34
(Jaeger 2:119)
,
(PG 44:114)
G N
2.95
1 1
and incorruptible." As a consequence, all three of the constituent elements of the metamorphosis of humanityimmortality
wrought through resurrection, apatbeia as freedom from sin and
liberation from passion, and the illumination of the human logos
by the divine Logoswere a manifestation of the deification that
was the outcome and fulfillment of the image of God, "of the
likeness with God [tes pros ton theon homoioseos]," through
which the bearer of the new image of God would "pass automatically and without effort from this earthly life to the life of
heaven."
CHAPTER
19
Otis 1961,146-65
"mountain" of asceticism to the "throne" of the episcopacy, attempted to return to monastic seclusion. This brought upon him
the accusation of having disgraced the priesthood of the church
by desertion. In the peroration of his defense against that charge
in the second of his orations, after having summarized the requirement of ritual purity that had been imposed on Levitical
worship in the Old Testament, he proceeded to characterize the
distinctive requirements of Christian worship in a periodic sen-
Fleury 1930,131-33
Gr Naz Or z
(SC 147:211-14)
Rom 12:1
Ps 49:14
is 50:4
Ps 56:9
Rom 12:1
.. _ ,
Gr.Nyss.Or.aom.3
(PG 44:1149)
Rom 12:1
Lit.Bas
(Brightman 322)
Vblk 1893,56-63
,
s
(Hussey 2:661-62)
jstaier 1915
2-97
Gr.Nyss.V.Mos.2
(Jaeger 7-1:43)
Gr.Naz.Or.2.95
(SC 147:212-14)
Gr.Nyss. Or.catech.9.1
(Meridier 64)
Danielou 1951,76-93
Gr.Naz.Or.8.18
(PG 35:809)
Mt 9:22
Thurston 190910,
75-79
Gr.Naz.Or.18.29
(PG 35:1020)
Gr.Naz.Or.18.9-10
(PG 35:996-97)
Hauser-Meury
1960,134-35
See pp.2223
Mt 26:26-27
teleiosai tas cheiras]," that is, the principle that moral virtue was
the appropriate vehicle for divine service. These three questions
within Christian liturgical theology are of the most direct significance for an understanding of the role of natural theology in the
Cappadocian system of church dogmatics, because in their treatment of each question the Cappadocians did presuppose and
draw upon insights and principles that they formulated in their
reasonings about "moral and natural philosophy," which was
joined to "the more sublime life [of Christian worship]."
By describing the eucharistic mystery as "the external sacrifice, the antitype of the great mysteries," Gregory of Nazianzus
affirmed, as did Nyssen, the indissoluble tie between the sacraments of the church and the historical economy of salvation in the
events of the incarnation, life, death, and resurrection of Jesus
Christ. For it was in the first instance these events of the divine
economy that he was identifying as "the great mysteries [megala
mysteria]," indeed the greatest of all the mysteries, from which
the sacramental mysteries such as the Eucharist, baptism, and
other "external" liturgical actions, being "antitypes," derived
their efficacy and to which they were in that sense subordinated.
He invoked the same term "antitype" elsewhere in speaking
about the miraculous eucharistic cure once experienced by his
sister, Gorgonia. After human medicines had failed her in a grave
illness, she "applied her medicine to her whole body, that is, such
a portion of the antitypes of the precious body and blood [of
Christ] as she treasured in her hand [ti ton antitypon tou timiou
somatos e tou haimatos he cheir ethesaurisen]," and she was
healed miraculously by divine power. It remains a matter of controversy among scholars whether this statement provides early
documentary evidence for the practice of reserving the elements
of the Eucharist. But there can be no doubt that the liturgical rites
of "celebrating the mysteries," even in truncated form, did carry
a special and miraculous power for Gregory, as was evident from
the oration that he delivered on the death of his father in 3 74. The
very formulas of the liturgy were identified there as "mystical,"
and the eye of the worshiper was "mystically sealed," as Gregory
said in speaking about the liturgical piety of his mother, Nonna.
Because the Eucharist was properly identified as a "mystery
[mysterion]," it called forth the language appropriate to religious
mysteries (including the language of non-Christian religious
mysteries). What Christ transmitted to his disciples when he said
in instituting the Eucharist, "Take, eat," and "Drink from it,"
Gr.Nyss.Gwzr.io
(Jaeger 6:308)
Lenz 1925,1171
Gr.Nyss.Or.catecfc.37.1z
(Meridier 182.)
See pp.1045
OED 11-11:256
Mt 17:2
Gr.Naz.Or.29.19
(SC 250:218)
Gr.Nyss.Or.catecfc.i8.2
(Meridier 92)
Gr.Naz.Or.39.3
(PG 36:336-37)
DTC 15:1396-1406
Gr.Naz.Or.8.20
(PG 35:811-13)
Fleury 1930,25-27
2-99
N a t u r a l Theology as Presupposition
300
Gr.Naz.On40.z8
(PG 36:400)
Gr.Naz.Or.38.11
(PG 36:311-14)
Gr.Naz.Or.40.8
(PG 36:368)
See pp.103-4,236-37
L a m p e 150910
Gr.Nyss.CanZ.z
(Jaeger 6:51-53)
Gr.Nyss.Or.Ctftecfc.35.1
(M^ridier 160)
LTK
6:IOOI-Z
Florovsky 13:8694
Luislampe 1981,35-49
Mt 18:19
Bas.iip.159.1
(Courtonne 1:86)
urge: "Those who are still children, and conscious neither of the
loss nor of the grace, [should be baptized early], especially if any
danger presses. For it is better that they should be unconsciously
sanctified than that they should depart this life unsealed and
uninitiated." In any case it was to come by the end of the third
year, more or less. His definition of the effects of baptism was in
keeping with his standard definition of the duality of human
nature, a presupposition that was for him, and for Cappadocian
thought as a whole, not only a doctrine of divine revelation but a
demonstrable fact available also to the natural reason. Therefore,
his doctrine of baptism, which was a doctrine of revelation, saw
the sacrament as dealing with both "soul and body, one part
visible and the other invisible." The Cappadocian metaphysics of
light, another presupposition in which the insights of philosophy
and natural science and the teachings of revelation both had a
part, was echoed in their use of the patristic metaphor for baptism as "the grace of illumination [tou photismatos chads]." But
even while formulating their doctrine of baptism, and of the sacramental mysteries in general, they continued to be acutely conscious of the primacy of the transcendent reality of baptism over
any "doctrine" about baptism.
For the Cappadocians, baptism was in many ways the most
cogent example of what Nazianzen called "the spirit of speaking
mysteries and dogmas"which meant both mysteries and
dogmas, and ultimately neither dogmas without mysteries nor
mysteries without dogmas. This can, then, be taken as an enunciation of the principle, "The rule of prayer determines the rule of
faith [lex orandi lex credendi]," which in that Latin formulation
was a Western principle, but which in its content was universal
throughout patristic thought and was probably applied even
more fully and more frequently in the Christian East than in the
Christian West. "As we were baptized," Basil summarized the
orthodox axiom, "so we profess our faith; and as we profess our
faith, so also we offer our praise [hos baptizometha, houto kai
pisteuomen; hos pisteuomen, houto kai doxologoumen]. As then
baptism has been given us by the Savior in the name of the Father
and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, so we make our confessior
of the creed in accordance with our baptism, and our doxology in
turn in accordance with our creed." The most nearly appropriate
language for rational creatures to use in acknowledging divine
transcendence was not the language of doctrine at all, not even
that of the orthodox Nicene doctrine, but the language of doxology and worship, and of silent worship at that, which was how
Scazzoso 1975,17181
2 Cor 12:4
Gr.Nyss.MM. 1.314
(Jaeger 1:120)
Gr.Nyss.EMM.3.1.16
(Jaeger 2:9)
Gr.Naz.Or.28.20
{SC 250:140)
Gr.Naz.Or.32.14
(50318:114)
Rom 11:33
Gr.Nyss.EM.3.1.104-6
(Jaeger 2:39)
Gr.Naz.Or.14.30
(PG 35:900)
Gr.Nyss.Or.dom. 1
(PG 44:1120)
Humbertclaude 1932,
193-309
301
N a t u r a l Theology as Presupposition
Gr.Nyss.Cawi.i
(Jaeger 6:27)
Bas.Ep.234.2
(Courtonne 3:43);
Gr.Nyss.EwK. 3.1.109
(Jaeger 2:40)
1 Tm 3:16
Eun.ap.Gr.Nyss. Eun.
3.9.54 (Jaeger 2:284)
Pelikan 197189,
5:140-41
Jas 2:19
1 Cor 13:13
Aug.Enchir.z.8
(CCSL 46:52)
Newman 1901,44568
Gr.Nyss. Trin.
(Jaeger 3-1:6)
Bas.5pm7.16
(SC 17:300)
Gr.Naz.Or.n.34
(SC 270:184)
Gr.Naz.Or.39.3
(PG 36:337)
Gr.Naz.Or.41.1
(PG 36:42.9)
Bas.fp.223.3
(Courtonne 3:1213)
Eun.ap.Gr.Nyss.EwM.
3.3.17 (Jaeger 1:113)
Bas.Ep.2.8.1
(Courtonne 1:66)
Gr.Nyss..i.70
(Jaeger 1 -.46)
303
coordination of "the orthodox party" with "the devout sentiment of the laity [ton laon to philotheon]," as twin bulwarks of
Nicene doctrine and as sources of pressure on those who hesitated to take a stand. Elsewhere he contrasted this congruence
between "lex orandi" and "lex credendi" with the relation between truth and fable according to "the mysteries" of Greek
paganism: "For what they worship as true, they veil as mythical.
But if these things are true, they ought not to be called 'myths' but
to be proved not to be shameful; and if they are false, they ought
not to be the objects of worship [thaumazesthai]." He also
charged that Judaism had similarly restricted itself to the externals of cultic observance, but without "attaining to the spiritual
law."
Perhaps the most vigorous affirmation of this congruence and
continuity between "lex orandi" and "lex credendi" anywhere in
the writings of the Cappadocians appeared in an autobiographical letter of Basil, amounting to an "apologia pro vita sua" and
written perhaps four years before his death, thus in about 375:
"The teaching about God that I had received as a boy from my
blessed mother and my grandmother Macrina ['the Elder'], I have
ever held with increasing conviction [auxetheisan]. On my coming to the mature years of reason, I did not shift my opinions from
one to another, but carried out the principles handed on to me as
tradition [paradotheisas] by my parents. Just as the seed when it
grows is tiny at first and then grows bigger but always preserves
its identity [tauto estin heautoi], not changed in kind though
gradually perfected in growth, so I consider that the same doctrine has in my case grown through a development [dia tes prokopes]. What I hold now has not replaced what I held at the
beginning." This came in response to such accusations as those of
Eunomius, that Basil was "substituting his own mind for the
intention of the apostles" and was "referring his own nonsense to
the memory of the saints." For Basil consistently presented himself as being (in a phrase he used to describe one of his departed
colleagues) "a guardian of the principles of the fathers, an enemy
of novelty-mongering [phylax patroion thesmon, neoteropoiias
echthros], exhibiting in himself the ancient pattern [schema] of
the church and making the state of the church placed under him
conform to the ancient constitution." Doctrinal novelty was so
dangerous, according to Basil's brother Gregory, because "the
dogmas of religious devotion [ta tes eusebeias dogmata]" had
been clearly and decisively, if apophatically, revealed.
Fedwick 1981,1:33760
Gr.Naz.Or.26.1
(SC 284:224)
Gr.Naz.Or.z2.12
(SC 270:244)
Jn 2o:28;Acts 7:59;
Phil 2:911
ap.Ath.Ar.1.8
(PG 26:28)
Gr.Nyss. Fid. 3
(Jaeger 3-1:62)
ap.Gr.Naz.Or.31.12
(SC 250:296)
LTK 10:665-66
LTK 10:666
Mt 28:19-20
Dorries 1956,13234,148-56
Florovsky 9:21
Bas.Spir.1.3
(SC 17:157)
Bas.Spir.10.z4
(SC 17:332)
Gr.Nyss. Maced.
(Jaeger 3-1:105)
Symb.Nic-CP
(Alberigo-Jedin 24)
Gr.Naz.Or.29.21
(SC 250:224)
Gr.Naz.Or.2.95
(SC 247:214)
Gr.Naz.Or.2.95
(SC 247:214)
Mt 7:24-27
Gr.Naz.Or.4.11
(SC 309:102)
Mt 7:20
305
that process of making sense of worship was evoked by the "innovation" he had introduced into the Gloria Patri, when he pronounced it "in both forms, at one time 'with [meta] the Son
together with [syn] the Holy Spirit,' and at another, 'through
[dia] the Son in [en] the Holy Spirit.' " But the issue of liturgical
form was clearly, both for his opponents and for him, not only an
end in itself but even more importantly a way of discussing trinitarian doctrine. By its "coordination [syntaxis]" of the Spirit
with the Father and the Son, whom it linked together by means of
the simple copula "and [kaij," the fundamental liturgical form
derived from the great commission of Christ required, Basil
urged, that the church's doctrine accordingly affirm an ontological "fellowship and conjunction [koinonia kai synapheia]" and
hence an equality among all three. Arguing similarly, but from
the effects of baptism rather than from the baptismal formula as
such, Gregory of Nyssa asserted that because baptism conferred
"a participation in a life no longer subject to death [to zoes
metechein ouketi thanatoi hypokeimenes]," the Spirit who effected such a participation in immortality had to be not only immortal but capable of conferring immortalityas the NicenoConstantinopolitan Creed declared, "life-giving [zoopoion]."
The importance of this method of argumentation as part of the
process leading up to the codification of the orthodox dogma of
the Trinity properly belongs to the history of the development of
Christian doctrine, but it carries special interest also here; for the
method was a particularly intriguing documentation of the process by which faith could give fullness to reasoning, but also of
the process by which reasoning gave fuller expression to faith, the
faith represented by Nazianzen's "spirit of speaking mysteries
and dogmas [to pneuma laloumenon mysterion te kai dogmaton]."
Even while they were speaking both about the sacramental
mysteries and about the orthodox dogmas, however, the Cappadocians did not lose sight of the moral categorical imperative
that the priest's "hands must be made perfect by holy works,"
and that therefore not only the clergy but also the laity had to go
beyond the externals of liturgical observance to authentic holiness. The words with which the Sermon on the Mount concluded, contrasting the man who built his house on a rock with
the man who built his house on sand, were for Gregory of
Nazianzus a warning to those casual converts who did not take
faith and its imperatives seriously. Just before those words stood
the warning of Christ, "You will recognize them by their fruit,"
306
Gr.Nyss.ApoU.
(Jaeger 3-1:131)
Florovsky 2:133
Janini Cuesta 1947,
348-52
See pp.146-50
Gr.Nyss. V.Mos.
(Jaeger 7-1:38)
Gr.Nyss. Paup.z
(Van Heck 35)
Gr.Nyss. V.Mos. 2.
(Jaeger 7-1:43)
Rom 12:1
i Tm 3:15
Gr.Nyss. Cant. 14
(Jaeger 6:419)
Mt 22:3740
Bas.Mor.3.1
(PG 31:705)
Arist.EN. 1098a; 1095b
Spidlik 1976,35864
Gr.Naz.Or.4.113
(SC 309:270)
Gr.Naz.Or.43.1z
(PG 36:509)
Gr.Naz.Or.21.1920
(SC 270:148-50)
Gr.Naz.Or.14.5
(PG 35:864)
Gr.Nyss.Wrg.4
(Jaeger 8-1:266-68)
Arist.EN.n39a
Arist.EN.i095b
Nikolaou 1981,24-31
Gr.Naz.Or.18.35
(PG 35:1032)
Gr.Naz.Or.32.10
(SC 318:104-6)
307
~JoW~
Gr.Naz.Or.33.2
(SC 318:158-60)
Lit.Bas.
(Brightman 330)
ReiUy 1945,212.4
Jn 17:21
Gr.Naz.Or.4.37
(SC 309:136)
Rom 12:5;! Cor 12:27;
Eph i:2>;Eph 4:12;
Co) i:24;2:i9
Gr.Naz.Or.14.8
(PG 35:868)
See pp.148-49
Gr.Naz.Or.8.14
(PG 35:805)
Welsserheimb 1948,
4*3-33
Malevez 1935,26080;
Nothomb 1954,31821
Gr.Nyss.Gmr.13
(Jaeger 6:383)
Gr.Naz.Or.30.20
(SC 250:266-68)
Col 1:17
Eph 3:1012
Gr.Nyss.CM.8
(Jaeger 6:255)
Gr.Nyss.EttB.z.222
(Jaeger 1:290)
N a t u r a l Theology as Presupposition
Gr.Naz.Or.15.!
(50284:158-60)
See pp.17783
Callahan 19586,2957
Gr.Nyss.CtfKi.7
(Jaeger 6:2x2-23)
Gr.Nyss. V.Macr.
(Jaeger 8-1:385)
Gr.Naz.Or.18.35
(PG 35:1032)
Batiffol 1921,9-30
Bas.Ep.203.3
(Courtonne 2:17071)
Gr.Nyss.Bear. 1
(PG 44:1196)
Giet 1944,95128;
Winslow 1965,348-59
Mt 25:40
Gr.Nyss.Paup. 1-2
(Van Heck 3-37)
Gr.Naz.Or.14
(PG 35:858-909)
Gr.Naz.Or.2.95
(SC 247:214)
Gr.Naz.or.40.25
(PG 36::J93)
See pp.][36-51
Wilken 1970,437--58
Is 52:5
Rom 1: M
309
"myth" and a Christian martyr who carried out his action "before the face of God and of the angels and of all the fullness of the
church." It may therefore have been more than simply a play on
the Greek word "philosophia," which referred both to "philosophy" and to "monasticism," and on the Greek word "kosmos,"
which meant both "universe" and "ornament," when Gregory of
Nyssa used "philosophia" to identify monasticism as "kosmos
ekklesias," or when he spoke of an ordination as "philosophy
enriched by priesthood [tei hierosynei tes philosophias epauxetheises]."
Nazianzen's rhetorical praise for the "order" in the civil community as superior to that in the church had a counterpart
in Basil's ecclesiology. Basil criticized the social indifference of
Christians, which was "neither decorous before men nor pleasing
to God." They were being shamed by the social consciousness of
"those who do not know God." He continued: "Yet we, the sons
of fathers who have laid down the law that by brief notes the
proofs of communion should be carried about from one end of
the earth to the other, and that all should be citizens and family
members with all [kai pantas pasi politas kai oikeious einai], now
cut ourselves off from the whole world." But "the distribution of
arete" was such that it was both individual and collective. Above
all, the members of the church were not to cut themselves off from
the poor. The words of Christ at the last judgment, "Anything
you did for one of my brothers here, however insignificant, you
did for me," provided Gregory of Nyssa with his text for two
powerful sermons of advocacy on behalf of the poor. Gregory of
Nazianzus also devoted an entire oration to the plight of the poor
and to the responsibility of individual believers and of the church
for their care. His insistence that the priest had to have "hands
made perfect by holy works" rather than by mere ritual purity
applied as well to the laity, who were not to excuse themselves
from their social responsibility for the poor on the grounds that
they wanted to be able to make financial contributions to the
church. Because so much of this moral content of Christian arete
was available to, and present in, the natural order of those who
did not share in the grace of Christ, admonitions to Christians to
lead a moral life within Greco-Roman society had an apologetic
significance as well as a hortatory and liturgical one, as the apostle Paul had indicated when he warned the Romans, quoting
Isaiah, "Because of you the name of God is profaned among the
Gentiles." Gregory of Nyssa was paraphrasing that apostolic
warning when he admonished: "Those who have not yet believed
Gr.Nyss.Or.dom.3
(PG 44:1153)
Mt 5:23-2.4
Bas.Mor.5.4
(PG 31:709)
Bas.Ep.203.3
(Courtonne 2:17071)
Gr.Naz.Or.40.2
(PG 36:361)
Gr.Nyss.Paup.i
(Van Heck 9)
Mt 25:32-33
Wilder 1939
the word of truth closely examine the lives of those who have
received the mystery of the faith. If, therefore, people are 'faithful'
only in name, but contradict this name by their life . . . then the
pagans immediately attribute this not to the free choice of these
evil-living men, but to the mystery that is supposed to teach these
things. For, they say, such and such a man who has been initiated
into the divine mysteries would not be such a slanderer, or so
avaricious and grasping, or anything equally evil, unless sinning
were lawful for them." Thus, Christian worship by those who
had been "initiated into the divine mysteries" had to be, also in
this sense, "the well-pleasing worship which we, as rational creatures, should offer" and which other rational creatures, including
those people who were not believers, or not yet believers, could
recognize as valid, as Christ had warned his disciples in the Sermon on the Mount. But when Basil objected that Christians,
whose duty it was to "be citizens and family members with all"
were instead "cutting [themselves] off from the whole world"; or
when Gregory of Nazianzus, describing the final judgment,
spoke of it as "bringing together in a moment all mankind, to
stand before its Creator"; or when Gregory of Nyssa exhorted his
hearers to their duties toward the downcast of society by invoking the coming of the Son of man at the end of human history to
judge the sheep and the goatsthey were all raising, in the context of both "eschatology and ethics," the question of the contribution of natural theology as well as of revealed theology to the
universality of the human hope and of the Christian hope for "the
life of the aeon to come."
CHAPTER
20
Gr.Nyss. Cant.i
(Jaeger 6:17)
Symb.Nic.-CP
(Alberigo-Jedin 24)
See pp.13134
See pp.287-90
Gr.Nyss.Hom.opif.i$-z6
(PG 44:2.24)
Gr.Naz.Or.29.19
(5C 250:218)
Coulie 1985,195-201
311
Bas.Sp(V.8.i8
(5017:310)
Gr.Naz.Or.4.44
(SC 309:144)
Bas.SpM8.18
(SC 17:310)
Bas.p.42.1
(Courtonne 1:100)
Gr.Nyss. Infant.
(Jaeger 3-11:93)
Bas.Sp<>.8.i8
(SC 17:310)
OED 11-111:243
Gr.Nyss.Cant.15
(Jaeger 6:469)
Gr.Naz.Or.33.9
(SC 318:174-76)
Gr.Naz.Or.14.25
(PG 35:889)
Mt 5:45
Gr.Naz.Or.33.12
(50318:182)
Gr.Nyss.Ref.48
(Jaeger 2:332)
Gr.Naz.Or.4.117
(SC 309:280)
Pl.Tim.3<>e-4ia
Gr.Nyss.Maced
(Jaeger 3 - I : i o i )
Ps75:i
Gr.Nyss.V.Mos.i
(Jaeget 7-1:6)
Gr.Nyss.Gzrcr.14
(Jaeger 6:427-28)
Rom 11:16
Srephan 1938,923
Gr.Nyss.Or.carecfc.30.3
(Meridier 138)
Acts 2:4
Jn 14:1
Gr.Nyss.G7Kr.15
(Jaeger 6:459-60)
Gr.Naz.Or.45.10
(PG 36:636)
Gr.Nyss.Anim.res.
(PG 46:68)
Bas.Hex.1.2
(SC 26:9294}
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:21)
Gr.Naz.Or.16.5
(PG 35:940-41)
313
Spirit], and which we are bidden to keep, and with which I have
to stand before my Judge to give an account of my heavenly
nobility, and of the divine image. Everyone, then, is noble who
has guarded this through arete and through consent to the archetype. " The unity of mankind was, in such a context, to be found
in its standing before Christ as the one judge of heaven and earth;
and it was thus a corollary of the monotheism for which Cappadocian apologetics contended and which it claimed to find
expressed, though ever so faintly, in Greek thought, especially in
the philosophical theology of Plato.
The God in whom Jew believed was, according to Gregory of
Nyssa, "our God, too." Yet despite this privileged position that
the Cappadocians acknowledged for the historical revelation of
God to Israel, both their view of the beginning and their vision of
the end required them to affirm that God had not been only
"known in Judea [gndstos en tei Ioudaiaij" through revealed
theology, but by natural theology known also to the Chaldeans,
Egyptians, and Babylonians. The Greeks occupied a special place
among those Gentiles whose salvation with "the nature of humanity as a whole [pasan ten anthropinen physin]" was part of
Paul's eschatological vision in Romans. To that ultimate goal of
salvation, "the totality of mankind, without exception" were
"equally called without respect to rank, age, or nationality,"
as the miracle of the apostles' speaking in all the tongues of
the world at Pentecost had showed. At the same time, this
eschatological equality of all mankind did not preclude variations and degrees of glory in a heavenly "Father's house" that was
not uniform but had "many dwelling-places." Both for the positive recognition of natural theology and for the polemic against
its inadequacies, eschatology provided Cappadocian thought
with ammunition. Although they were by no means undiscriminating in their willingness to invoke linguistic parallels from
Classical Greek for the vocabulary of the New Testament, they
were often willing to do so. Specifically, Macrina and her brother
Gregory did cite such parallels between what was found "in the
writings of those on the outside and the divine Scripture [para de
ton exothen kai para tes theias graphes]" for its eschatological
vocabulary, which was "in frequent circulation both in the relationships of daily life and in the writings of those on the outside
and in our own." Conversely, one of the major criticisms directed
by all the Cappadociansby Basil, by Macrina according to the
report of her brother Gregory of Nyssa, as well as by Gregory of
Nazianzus in an oration delivered in 373against the natural
TT^T
Gi.Nyss.Infant.
(Jaeger 3-H:7i)
Gr.Naz.Or.17.4
(PG 35:969)
Gr.Nyss.V.Mos.2
(Jaeger 7-1:119)
1 Cor 2:9
Gr.Nyss.Or.catech. 40.7
(Meridier 194-96)
Gv.Nyss.Hom.opif. z 3
{PG 44:2-09)
N a t u r a l Theology as Presupposition
theology propounded by "the Greek philosophers [hoi ton Hellenon sophoi]" was their lack of a satisfactory doctrine about the
direction in which nature and history were headed under the
guidance of divine providence.
It was, however, particularly in the exposition of their doctrine
of divine providence that the Cappadocians emphasized its hiddenness, and it was likewise in their very celebration of divine
revelation about the end of life and the end of the world that they
insisted upon the language of negation as constituting the proper
lexicon of transcendence. There was, as Gregory of Nyssa
pointed out, an insatiable human curiosity to know about the
"intentions of each detail of the divine economy,'" especially as it
pertained to the end of life. Faith did make the affirmation: "If
nothing in the cosmos happens without God [atheei], but all is
linked to the divine will; and if the Deity is skillful and prudential, then it follows necessarily that there is some plan in these
things bearing the mark of his sophia, and at the same time of his
providential care. A blind unmeaning occurrence can never be the
work of God [to gar eikei ti kai alogos ginomenon ouk an ergon
eie theou]." On this score any natural theology that led to doctrines either of tyche or of ananke would have to be a deception.
Nevertheless it was, according to Gregory of Nazianzus, "a divine decree, ancient and firm [dogma theou palaion te kai pagion]," that the future plans of the providence of God were to
"remain hidden from our eyes." Drawing on the riches of biblical
imagery, Nyssen could recount a catalog of names about the
eternal honor and glory that were in store for the saved, which, at
first glance, could give the impression of providing explicit and
catapbatic information about the minutiae of the life of the aeon
to come. Not so, he warned elsewhere: "The promised blessings,
held out to those who have lived a good life, defy description. For
how can we describe 'things beyond our seeing, things beyond
our hearing, things beyond our imagining'?" Any effort to penetrate this veil and to ferret out catapbatic information he labeled
"the inquisitiveness of busybodies [polypragmosyne]." The
promise of Paradise regained and of the image of God restored
could be expressed only in "a description confined to ineffabilities [hes ho logos en aporretois menei]." For the divine
nature, even when it was holding out to humanity the prospect of
a future and final participation in itself, retained a transcendence
of which it was finally permissible to speak only in apophatic
language, with a generous sprinkling of alpha privatives: "a
simple and pure and constant and undeviating and unchang-
Gr.Nyss.Ca*.5
(Jaeger 6:158)
Gr.Nyss.V.Mos.2
(Jaeger 7-1:82)
2 Cor 12:1-5
See pp.47-48
Gr.Nyss. Beat. 4
(PG 44:1248)
Gr.Naz.Or.28.17
(SC 250:134-36)
1 Cor 13:12
Wis 7:26
1 Cor 13:12
Bas.Ep.8.12
(Courtonne 1:36)
Gr.Naz.Or.20.12
(SC 270:82)
315
ing nature [haple kai kathara kai monoeides kai atreptos kai
analloiotos physis]."
It was typical of Cappadocian thought to declare that this way
of knowing could be achieved only "by that well-known inexpressible knowledge of the divine [tei aporretoi ekeinei theognosiai]." Thus, the apostle Paul, after being "caught up as far as
the third heaven," was "filled with what he had tasted"and yet
the eschatological fruits of Paradise that he tasted were "ineffable." The difficulty of achieving some sort of harmony between
the language of negative theology and the expectation of a metamorphosis of knowledge in the life to come was well represented
in a passage from the orations of Gregory of Nazianzus, which
deserves to be quoted in full: "What God is in nature and essence,
no one has ever yet discovered or can discover. Whether it will
ever be discovered is a question that someone who wishes to do so
may examine and decide. In my opinion it will be discovered
when that within us which is Godlike and divine, I mean our
mind and logos, will have mingled with its like [the divine
Logos], and the image will have ascended to the archetype, of
which it now has the desire. And this, I think, is the solution of
that vexed problem as to the meaning of the words: 'Our knowledge then will be whole, like God's knowledge of us.' But in our
present life all that comes to us is but a little effluence, and as it
were a small effulgence from a great light." The quotation, "Our
knowledge then will be whole, like God's knowledge of us," was
a reference, not quite verbatim, to the familiar passage from the
apostle Paul: "At present we see only puzzling reflections in a
mirror, but one day we shall see face to face. My knowledge now
is imperfect; then it will be whole, like God's knowledge of me."
Basil used this passage to assert that because the kingdom of the
heavens consisted in contemplation, the present life consisted in
"beholding the shadows [of the heavens] as in a mirror [hos en
katoptroi]," but that the future life, "set free from this earthly
body and clad in the incorruptible and the immortal," would
consist in "beholding their archetypes." Yet, Gregory of Nazianzus elsewhere quoted the first half of that same passage, Paul's
statement about seeing "puzzling reflections in a mirror [en
ainigmati]," as a warning against intellectual presumption. The
experience of mystical rapture that Paul described in 2 Corinthians could likewise be read in both directions. It served as a primary instance of a state described in the words of Gregory of
Nyssa: "Every voice that conveys meaning by verbal utterance is
stilled, and unspoken meditation becomes the word of instruc-
316
Gr.Nyss.MK.3.1.16
Gr.Nyss.V1rg.13
(Jaeger 8-1:304)
Koch 1898,397420;
Horn 1927,11331
Gr.Nyss. Infant.
(Jaeger 3-11:78-79)
Gr.Nyss. Cant. 6
(Jaeger 6:178)
Mt 5:
Ex 33:2o;Jn 1:18
1 Tm 6:16
Gr.Nyss.Bear.6
(PG 44:1273)
Gr.Nyss. Cant. 8
(Jaeger 6:247)
Gr.Nyss. V.Mos. 2
(Jaeger 7I:n618)
Pl.Pfcdr.240c
Gr.Nyss. Beat.A,
(PG 44:1244)
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:96)
N a t u r a l Theology as Presupposition
tion, teaching to the purified heart by means of the silent illumination of the thoughts those truths which transcend speech."
Yet it could also be taken as a promise that by being cleansed and
having the image of God restored, the believer could be "taken up
again into Paradise, in which Paul, too, heard and saw unspoken
and unseen things, not repeatable by human lips."
As their constant reiteration of the language of seeing and
contemplating suggested, a central figure in the language of the
Cappadocians about the knowledge of God in the life of the aeon
to come was the biblical concept of the vision of God, which was
"the design [skopos] of everything being born." This was the goal
of the soul's advance toward heavenly bliss. Expounding the
promise of the vision of God in the Beatitudes of the Sermon on
the Mount, "Blessed are those whose hearts are pure; they shall
see God," Gregory of Nyssa distinguished two definitions of how
the term could be understood: "[It can mean], on the one hand,
knowing the nature that transcends the universe [ten tou pantos
hyperkeimenen physin], and on the other hand, being united to
him through purity of life." Only the second of these was being
promised in the words of Christ, because the authority of Scripture ruled out a knowledge of the divine nature in itself as "impossible. " N o notion of the vision of God was acceptable if it
appeared to compromise the impenetrable transcendence of
God. Above all, the emphasis on the vision of God enabled Cappadocian eschatology to articulate "the ultimate paradox of being static and dynamic at the same time [to panton paradoxotaton, pos to auto kai statis esti kai kinesis]," by its insistence
that the essence of the vision of God consisted in "never reaching
the point of satiety in yearning [touto estin ontos to idein ton
theon, to medepote tes epithymias koron heurein]." Physical
pleasures and human relationships, according to Plato in the
Pbaedrus, reached the point where "you may have more than
enough of this [homos koron ge kai he touton synousia echei]."
Echoing those words of the Pbaedrus, Gregory of Nyssa pointed
out: "The possession of arete, on the other hand, where it is once
firmly established, is neither circumscribed by time nor limited
by satiety [ou chronoi metreitai, oute koroi periorizetai]," but
eternal, like its divine object. For, in Macrina's words, "The life of
[God as] supreme being is love, seeing that the kalon is necessarily lovable to those who recognize it. . . . This true kalon the
insolence of satiety cannot touch [tou de alethos kalou he
hybrites ou prosaptetai koros]." Such a freedom from cloying
Gr.Nyss.G/.i2
(Jaeger 6:366)
Gr.Nyss. Cant. 1
(Jaeger 6:3 z)
Bas.Spm9.23
(SC 17:328)
Gr.Nyss. Or.dom. 2
(PG 44:1137)
Merki 1952
Pl.TTim.48e
1 Cor 11:1
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:8992)
Gr.Nyss. Or.dom. 5
(PG 44:1177)
Bas.Sp7V.15.35
(SC 17:366)
Gr.Nyss.Cawr.15
(Jaeger 6:466)
Gr.Nyss. Or.dom. 5
(PG 44:1177-80)
Mt 6:12
Gr.Nyss. Or.dom. 5
(PG 44:1177-80)
Gr.Nyss. Cant.y
(Jaeger 6:280)
317
satiety was true already here and now of "the soul with the vision
of God." But it was chiefly in speaking about life eternal after the
resurrection that deliverance from any surfeit of the vision of God
was central. For it was not only the case that there was "a ceaseless attraction" exerted upon lesser goods by the supremely
good; but being "in its nature infinite," this first good granted to
those who participated in the enjoyment of it an infinite sharing,
with "more always in the process of being grasped, and yet something even beyond that always waiting to be discovered." In the
ascent to God, already here in time but especially also hereafter in
eternity, there was no stopping and no satiety.
Yet even such language about the knowledge of God and the
vision of God was not an adequate vehicle for Cappadocian eschatology, which embraced nothing less than the combination of
all of the following graces: "Foreknowledge of the future [mellonton prognosis], understanding of mysteries, apprehension of hidden reality, distribution of good gifts, the heavenly citizenship, a
place in the chorus of angels, joy without end, abiding in God,
being made like to Godand, highest of all, being made God
[theon genesthai]!" The life of the aeon to come, of which the
creed spoke, was not merely the vision of God but tbeosis. An
eschatology of theosis called for careful defining and precise distinguishing, in the dual context of Cappadocian apologetics and
Cappadocian dogmatics. Sometimes, therefore, in describing this
process, the Cappadocians could also employ terminology that
was rather less audacious than tbeosis was. Appropriating the
concept of the "imitation [mimesis]" of the divine model, which
had roots in both the Classical and Christian traditions, Macrina
spoke of "the real assimilation [homoiosis] to the divine" as
consisting "in making our own life in some degree an imitation
[en toi mimeisthai pos] of the transcendent being." As he looked
for an expression of the new reality, Gregory of Nyssa had recourse to similar language. Basil, too, described Paul as "the
imitator of Christ [ho mimetes tou Christou]." It was a more
vivid description when Gregory of Nyssa referred to it as a
"union [symphyia] with the only good." He also spoke rather
unspecifically about "some sort of transformation of human nature into something more divine [metabalon tropon tina ten anthropinen physin pros to theioteron]."
Then, however, he immediately asserted: "He is legislating
that those who approach God should themselves become gods."
Theosis was "the very telos of the life of arete." But it was as well
the complement of the orthodox doctrine of the Trinity of Father,
Gr.Nyss.HW.3.3.67
(Jaeger ZH31)
Gr.Naz.Or.z9.1p
(SC 250:218)
Bas.5pm9.23
(SC 17:328)
Gr.Naz.or.39.17
(PG 36:353-56)
Gr.Nyss.Btrar.7
(PC 44:1280)
Gr.Nyss.Maced.
(Jaeger 3-1:91)
Gr.Nyss. Virg. 11
(Jaeger 8-1:296)
Gr.Nyss. Cant. 1
(Jaeger 6:28-29)
Faller 1925,40535
Gr.Naz.Ep.101
(PG 37:180)
Son, and Holy Spirit. It was the necessary corollary of the incarnation, for through the incarnation "the human nature [of the
Son of God] was renewed by becoming divine through its commixture with the divine [dia tes pros to theion anakraseos]." In
the person of the incarnate Son "man and God . . . became a
single whole . . . , in order to make me God to the same extent
that he was made man [hina genomai tosouton theos, hoson
ekeinos anthropos]." The doctrine of theosis and the doctrine of
the deity of the Holy Spirit were also mutually supportive corollaries, for example in Basil's argument that the Holy Spirit had to
be divine. "How could [the Holy Spirit] not be God," in the
statement of the same case by Gregory of Nazianzus, "by whom
you, too, were made God?" It does seem that in presenting this
eschatology of theosis, the Cappadocians were thinking of a fundamental ontological change, as in the apostrophe of Gregory of
Nyssa: "With what words, what thoughts that move our mind
can we praise this abundance of grace [ten tes charitos hyperbolen] ? Man transcends [ekbainei] his own nature, he who was
subject to corruption in his mortality becomes immune from it in
his immortality, becomes eternal instead of being stuck in time
in a word, from a man he becomes God [theos ex anthropou
ginomenos]."
The content of the term "God," however, even when used in
such a context, came at least in part from a process of natural
theology: "When once our minds have grasped the idea of a
divine nature, we accept by the implication of that very name the
perfection in it of every conceivable thing that befits deity." That
divine perfection expressed itself in the "incorruptibility [aphtharsia]" of the nature of God, and it was by attaining, "through
'aphtharsia,' the utmost purity possible" that the soul reached
theosis. The perfection of God expressed itself as well in the
divine apatheia, which was likewise communicated through theosis to a deified humanity. Yet all of this Christian language about
a humanity made divine was part of a total Cappadocian system
in which the Classical religion of deified men and women and of
anthropomorphic gods and goddesses was described as "the superstition of polytheism" and as the error of those mere mortals
who had "turned aside the honor of God to themselves." Therefore, the Cappadocians insisted that it was as essential for theosis
as it was for the incarnation itself not to be viewed as analogous
to Classical Greek theories about the promotion of human beings
to divine rank, and in that sense not to be defined by natural theology at all; on such errors they pronounced their"Anathema!"
Gr.Nyss..2.222
(Jaeger 1:290)
Gr.Nyss.Hom.opif.pt.
(PG 44:125)
Gn 1:1
Gr.Nyss. H0m.0pif.z5
(PG 44:209)
Gr.Nyss.Hex.
(PG 44:72)
Gr.Nyss. Or.catech. 27.2
(Meridier 126)
Gr.Nyss. H0m.0pif.z4
(PG 44:213)
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. {PG 46:105)
Gillet 1962,62-83
Gr.Nyss. Infant.
(Jaeger 3-11:78-79)
319
Acts 3:11
Gr.Nyss.Or.dom.4
(PG 44:1165)
Gr.Nyss.EMn.2.222
(Jaeger 1:290)
Gr.Nyss.Cant.S
(Jaeger 6:254)
Portmann 1954,20-21
Gr.Nyss.V.Mos.2
(Jaeger 7-1:82)
Gr.Naz.Or.38.13
(PC 36:325)
Bas.Hex.1.6
(SC 26:110)
ity] has necessarily been allotted to the earthly life because of the
kinship of our body, which is, as it were, a sediment of mud, with
what is earthly. Now I do not know what the purpose of the
divine will was in so ordering it. Perhaps it was to bring the whole
creation into relationship with itself. . . . Thus the creation of
man would effect in each of the stoicheia a participation in the
things belonging to the other; for the spiritual nature of the soul,
which seems to be decidedly akin to the heavenly powers, dwells
in earthly bodies, and in 'the apocatastasis of all things' this
earthly flesh will be translated into the heavenly places together
with the soul." These words implied that it was the entire
cosmos, "our world and everything in it," that participated in
"the system and government of the universe [he tou pantos systasis kai dioikesis]," as directed from beginning to end by God as
its "origin and cause," as its end and goal, and as the principle of
its continuity. The movement from the "origin and cause" of all
things to their end under God's system and government meant
that because of "the variegated [polyoikilos] sophia of God,
through the economy among the human race in Christ," not only
human nature but the universe beyond humanity had come to
participate in the grace of the divine mysteries, by means of which
it was receiving a divine paideia.
Viewed eschatologically, therefore, the divine economy was a
process of paideia. Through it, "by a sequence according to the
order of history [di' akolothou kata ten tes historias taxin]," the
Logos was "leading our thought, as if by the hand, to the more
sublime heights of arete." All the events of human history and of
sacred history were divine instruments by which God was instructing and chastening the human race. Thus, the world was
"really the school for rational souls to exercise themselves, the
training ground for them to learn to know God." But the eschatological perspective led to the conclusion that at least as far
as "the most vital of all questions relating to our faith" were
concerned, this educational process would in many respects become more intelligible a posteriori than it had been while it was
going on. For this was the message of Scripture: "That when our
race has completed the ordered chain of its existence as the aeons
lapse through their complete circle [pote taxei tini kai heirmoi tes
physeos hemon kata ten parodiken tou chronou kinesin diexiouses], this current streaming onward as generation succeeds
generation will cease altogether; but also that then, when the
completed universe [tes tou pantos sympleroseos] no longer admits oi further increase, all the souls in their entire number will
Gr.Nyss. Anim.res.
(PG 46:12.9)
Gr.Nyss. V.Macr.
(PG 46:978)
1 Thes 4:17
Gr.Nyss. Or.catech.3 5
(Meridier 160-70)
Symb.Nic.-CP
(Alberigo-Jedin 24)
Col 3:14
Gr.Nyss. Cant.9
(Jaeger 6:262)
Gr.Naz.Ep.101
(PG 37:192)
Bas.Sp1V.r5.35
(SCr7.-3 7 o)
Bas.Hex.3-r
(SC 26:190)
Gr.Naz.Or.8.r9
(PG 35:812)
Gr.Nyss. Cant.t)
(Jaeger 6:262)
Bas.Ep.38.8
(Courtonne r:92)
Heb r:3;Col r : r 5 ;
Wis 7:26
Gr.Nyss. Ref.4
(Jaeger 2:314)
321
come back." The resurrection would follow, and only in the light
of this final eventuality would "the ordered chain of its existence,
the lapsing of the aeons through their complete circle" of human
history and of cosmic history make ultimate sense. It was, similarly, the final eventuality of the death of her brother Basil that
evoked from Macrina "still loftier philosophy" and reflection on
"the divine economy."
The expectation articulated by the apostle Paul, of being
"caught up in clouds to meet the Lord in the air" at the second
coming of Christ, therefore led to the conclusion that human
history was to be be viewed as "the time necessarily coextensive
with the development of humanity [oukoun anameinato ton
chronon ton anankaios tei anthropinei auxesei symparateinonta]." The Christ who had entered time and who had provided
the key to its mysteries was himself one who transcended it. The
eschatological understanding of the divine economy and of time
located human death itself within the sweep of divine providence,
but it did so in the light of the death of Christ. Such christocentrism defined the content of the orthodox and creedal doctrine of
"the life of the aeon to come." For, in Nyssen's formula, "The
genuine life made manifest in us is none other than Christ himself
[ten alethinen en hemin phanerothenai zoen, hetis estin ho
Christos]." It was specifically in the light of the events of the life,
suffering, death, and resurrection of Christ that Gregory of
Nazianzus attacked the astrological and cyclical interpretation of
history; for if that interpretation was correct, he asked, "What
hinders Christ also from being born a second time. . . and being
betrayed again by Judas and being crucified and buried and rising
again?" On the basis of these events of the life of Christ it was
possible as well "to describe the gospel as a foretaste of the life
following on the resurrection." It was also possible, in the light of
the rewards prepared for the life of the aeon to come, to identify
rewards granted by God here in time. The expectation of the life
of the aeon to come made the experiences of the present life a
"foretaste" of eternity. As Christ was already the center of time
and history but had not yet returned to be its consummation, so
the transformation that he both promised and figured forth was
here already and not yet here. For he was, from eternity with the
Father and in time and history through the incarnation, "the
stamp of God's very being," "the image of the invisible God,"
and "the image of his goodness."
As such, Christ was the one who effected "the transformation
of our nature from mortality to immortality." The Cappadocian
322.
See pp.12.7-35
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss. V.Macr.
(Jaeger 8-1:397)
Gr.Naz.Or.34.12
(SC 318:218)
Gc.Nyss.Beat.3
(PG 44:1225-28)
Bas.S/?/>.9.23
(SC
i7:)z6-z8)
Gr.Nyss. Ctfttr.9
(Jaeger 6:290)
Gr.Nyss.CdMf.15
(Jaeger 6:469)
Gr.Nyss.Ctfrar.i
(Jaeger 6:14-15)
Gr.Nyss.Or. rfom.3
(PG 44:1157)
Mt 6:10
Gr.Nyss.CaMf.i
(Jaeger 6:28-29)
Zemp 1970,177-96
Gr.Nyss.Beaf.i
(PG 44:1200)
N a t u r a l Theology as Presupposition
Gr.Nyss. Or.dom.)
(PG 44:1156)
Gr.Nyss. Cant. 5
(Jaeger 6:16061)
Gr.Nyss. Or.dom. 5
(PG 44:1177)
Mt 6:12
Gr.Nyss. Cant.6
(Jaeger 6:i 86)
See pp.15253,16165
Gr.Nyss. Ci7Mt4
(Jaeger 6:117)
Gr.Nyss. V.Mos. 2
(Jaeger 7-1:143)
Gr.Naz.Or.17.2
(PG 35:968)
Bas.Leg.lib.gent.z
(Wilson 20)
Gr.Nyss. V.Macr.
(Jaeger 8-1:395)
Gr.Nyss.Beaf.8
(PG 44:1301)
Gr.Nyss. Beat.-/
(PG 44:1289)
Gr.Nyss. V.Mos.2
(Jaeger 7-1:59)
32-3
perfect power above all things and governing the whole universe," did "not rule by violence and tyrannical dictatorship."
The life of arete, therefore, could reach its telos only if it was free
of external constraint. Exercising itself by free will in this arete, it
could attain to its goal. "It comes," according to Gregory of
Nyssa, "to the very peak of arete, for the words of the [Lord's]
Prayer outline what sort of a man one should be if one would
approach God. Such a man is almost no longer shown in terms of
human nature, but, through arete, is likened to God himself, so
that he seems to be another God, in that he does the things that
God alone can do," as, for example, to forgive sins. Human
nature would not attain to this telos immediately, but gradually
and by stages. For the very reason that a life of arete was by
definition teleological, it involved a "progress [prokope]" toward
this telos and a "growth [epauxesis]" that made it dynamic.
"Teleology," which was the doctrine of the telos, was fulfilled in
the achievement and gift of "teleiosis," perfection. And "telos,"
Nyssen explained in defining it, "I call that for the sake of which
everything happens."
As "teleiosis," perfection was, then, the telos and object of the
eschatological hope. Gregory of Nazianzus called up all his rhetorical powers to describe in graphic terms what it meant to live
without hope. For as Basil said in the very process of commending
the study of Classical Greek literature, "Our hopes lead us forward to a more distant time, and everything we do is by way of
preparation for the other life [pros heterou biou paraskeuen]." It
was this "hope of the resurrection [he elpis tes metastaseos]" that
sustained his sister, Macrina, on her deathbed. What were the
"prize" and "crown" toward which this teleology moved? asked
Gregory of Nyssa. And he answered: "It seems to me that what
we hope for is nothing else than the Lord himself." The obverse
side of this hope for the triumph of good was the annihilation of
evil, or, as he called it earlier in the same commentary, "the
annihilation of anything foreign to the good and devoid of affinity with the good." With his characteristic and consistent emphasis on the freedom of the will, Gregory insisted that the
"darkness" and "fire" of "hell [geenna]," too, had to be the
result of human "choice [proairesis]," not of divine necessity.
That emphasis was not easy to square with his articulation of the
hope for the eventual divine annihilation of evil: free will seemed
to mean that a human being had to be able to choose evil, not
only provisionally but permanently; and the annihilation of evil
Aufhauser 1910,2.057
2 Cor 5:10
Gr.Nyss.Beat.5
{PG 44:12.60)
Gr.Nyss.Or.catecb.8.10
(Meridier 56)
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anint. res. (PG 46:72)
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.ylttz'm.
res. (PG 46:100101)
Phil 2:10-11
1 Cor 15:28
Zemp 1970,24244
Caperan 1934
OED 11-111:243
Michaud 1902,3752;
Danielou 1940,328-47
Danielou 1970,20526
Gr.Naz.Or.45.18
(PG 36:661)
Bas.Hex.5.4
(SC 26:29294)
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:105)
Macr.ap.Gr.Nyss.
Anim.res. (PG 46:152)
Gr.Nyss.Ctf.io
(Jaeger 6:303-4);
Gr.Nyss.Beat.4
(PG 44:1240)
Jn 4--34
1 Tm 2:4
Gr.Nyss. Ref. 16-17
(Jaeger 2:318-19)
Florovsky 7:21119
Gr.Nyss. Ccmt.t,
(Jaeger 6:131)
Gr.Nyss. V.Mos.z
(Jaeger 7-1:57)
Gr.Nyss.A>m.res.
(PG 46:160)
Otis 1958,97
Girardi 1978,183-90
Bas.Mor.1.1
(PG 31:700)
Bas.Mor.pr.1.8
(PG 31:671)
EJIversen 2981,82
Daley 1991,84
1 Cor 15:28
AYtriaus 1972,14445
315
3 2.6
Gr.Naz.Or.30.6
(SC 150:138)
G N
Anim.res.(PG 46:160)
"when we are no longer what we are now, a multiplicity of impulses and emotions, with little or nothing of God in us, but are
fully like God, with room for God and God alone." And at the
other end of the spectrum (depending on how one reads the
treatise On the Soul and the Resurrection), Macrina shared her
brother Gregory's doctrine unequivocally, and dared to "take
some other position" from that of her brother Basil. Nevertheless, whatever the implicit and explicit differences among the
three (or four) of them may or may not have been, Gregory of
Nyssa did seem to be propounding apocatastasis as the only
possible expression for the eschatological hope that they all
shared, and indeed for the entire system of Cappadocian theology, both for the apologetics of their natural theology and for the
presuppositions and implications of their revealed theology.
GLOSSARY OF GREEK T E C H N I C A L T E R M S
F R O M SOURCES A N C I E N T & M O D E R N
These words, italicized throughout the book, are here arranged according
to the English alphabet. Most of them, either on their own or in compounds, have been domesticated as English words and have appeared in
one or another English dictionary (although often with meanings quite different from these, as the word "economy" dramatically illustrates); and
they are being spelled accordingly herefor example, "apocatastasis"
rather than "apo&atastasis"and without diacritical marks. Geoffrey
Lampe's A Lexicon of Patristic Greek is the standard authority to which to
turn for all such terms, and I have relied on it throughout. But these additional quotations and definitions have been selected, and put into the form
of a precis, from various other reference books or works of scholarship
Classical, Patristic, and modern. In such works, the various meanings of a
term are often separated by quotations from primary sources and by similar material, but it seemed preferable in such precis as these to dispense
with most of those quotations as well as with ellipsis points, and to adapt
the punctuation.
Aeon
[aicov]
Age, era; "saeculum" in Latin, usually "world" in older English translations. Bauer 17-28: " 1 . very long time, eternitya. of time gone by, the
earliest times, then eternity; b. of time to come which, if it has no end, is
also known as eternity. 2. a segment of time, agea. the present age (nearing its end); b. the age to come, the Messianic period. 3. the world as a
spatial concept." Florovsky 7:209: "Gregory [of Nyssa] maintains a clear
distinction between the terms aeonios (from aeon) and 'ai'dios' (from 'aei').
He never applies the second term to the torments [of hell] and he never applies the first term to bliss or the Deity. 'Aei' designates that which is superior to time or outside of time. It cannot be measured by the ages and it
does not move within time. This is the sphere of the Divinity. Creation,
however, abides within time and 'can be measured by the passing of the
centuries.' Aeon designates temporality, that which occurs within time."
327
Ananke
[ctv&Yxri]
Apatheia, apathes
[ajia6ia, &jia6if|cj
Apocatastasis
[anonaxaaiamc,]
Apophasis
[cut64>aoic;];
Cataphasis
[xmatyaoic,]
Arche
[ctoxVj]
Principle, beginning, ground of being; "principium" in Latin. Miiller 15355: "I. Beginning, 1. of universal time; 2. of creation; 3. of the coming of
32.9
Christ and of the gospel; 4. any beginning at all. II. specifically, the beginning of existence: 1. as something that is a property of things that have
been created; 2. attributed to the Logos-Son by the heretics, denied by the
orthodox. III. Concretely, the first part of a thing, specifically the beginning of a book or of a passage taken from Scripture, etc. IV. The principal
causes of things: 1. the elements of bodies; 2. by metonymy, God himself:
a) the divine Sophia; b) the Father; c) the Logos; 3. in the trinitarian controversies, the ousia of the Father. V. In the political sense, rule: 1. the
province of someone who rules; 2. the power of someone who rules; 3.
public office; 4. by metonymy, in the plural, the celestial hierarchs."
Arete
[agexri]
Cataphasis
[>caTa<j>aai5]
Economy
[olxovoula]
Excellence, valor; virtue. Jaeger 1939, 1:5: "We can find a natural clue to
the history of Greek culture in the history of the idea of arete, which goes
back to the earliest times. There is no complete equivalent for the word
arete in modern English: its oldest meaning is a combination of proud and
courtly morality with warlike valor. But the idea of arete is the quintessence of early Greek aristocratic education. In Homer, as elsewhere, the
word arete is frequently used in a wide sense, to describe not only human
merit but the excellence of non-human thingsthe power of the gods, the
spirit and speed of noble horses. But ordinary men have no arete; and
whenever slavery lays hold of the son of a noble race, Zeus takes away half
of his aretehe is no longer the same man as he was. Arete is the real attribute of the nobleman. The root of the word is the same as that of
'aristos,' the word which shows superlative ability and superiority; and
'aristos' was constantly used in the plural to denote the nobility. It was natural for the Greeks, who ranked every man according to his ability, to use
the same standard for the world in general. That is why they could apply
the word arete to things and beings which were not human, and that is
why the content of the word grew richer in later times."
Affirmation. See Apophasis.
Heimarmene
[El(iaoLiEvr|]
Homoousios
[ouoouaiog]
33
of physical objects, nor as if the Son subsisted out of the Father by way of
division or any sort of severance. The two sides are seen perfectly balanced
in Athanasius' own mind; homoousios implies 'of one stuff' as against
Arius, and'of one content'as against the retort that thereby was implied
the existence of two gods. The employment of homoousios by Athanasius
to express substantial identity was a new development in the Greek language. Philologically, it was a pure accident, arising from the peculiar circumstances of the object to which the term was on other grounds applied;
the special sense which it acquired was derived simply from theological associations, which belonged to the realm of thought rather than to that of
language."
i
Hypostasis
[i)Jt6oxaoig]
Kairos
[XCIIQ65]
Kalos, to kalon,
kalokagathia
[xcdoc,, to xodov,
KaXoKayaBia]
ODCC 685: "The Greek word has had a variety of meanings. In popular
language it was used originally for 'objective reality' as opposed to illusion. In the New Testament this seems to be roughly its meaning at Heb
1:3. It often came to be almost identical with ousia, i.e., to denote 'being'
or 'substantial reality.' But side by side with this usage the term also came
to mean 'individual reality' and, from the middle of the fourth century onwards especially in Christological contexts, a 'person.' It was mainly under
the influence of the Cappadocian Fathers that the terminology was clarified and standardized, and the theological ambiguities removed. From the
Council of Constantinople of 3 81 onwards the formula 'three hypostases
in one ousia' came to be everywhere accepted as an epitome of the orthodox doctrine of the Holy Trinity."
Bauer 394-95: "Time, i.e., point of time as well as period of time: 1. generally, 'kairos dektos,' a welcome time; 'kairoi karpophoroi,' in which the
tree bears fruit, in contrast to late autumn, when there is none. 2. the
right, proper, favorable time. 3. one of the chief eschatological terms: 'ho
kairos,' the time of crisis, the last times."
Nussbaum 1990, xiii: "Kalon is a word that signifies at once beauty and
nobility. It can be either aesthetic or ethical and is usually both at once,
showing how hard it is to distinguish these spheres in Greek thought."
Logos
[X.6705]
Word, reason: as qualities of the human mind, but originally and eternally
as the personal Word and Reason of God, the second hypostasis of the
Trinity. Jn 1:1-14: "In the beginning the Logos already was. The Logos
was in God's presence, and what God was, the Logos was. He was with
God at the beginning, and through him all things came to be; without him
no created thing came into being. In him was life, and that life was the
light of mankind. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has
never mastered it. The true light was in being, which gives light to everyone entering the world. So the Logos became flesh; he made his home
among us, and we saw his glory, such glory as befits the Father's only Son,
full of grace and truth."
Metamorphosis
[|iTau,6o<|>(jjaicJ
33i
"Continuing in the majesty of his own deity, he takes the meaner nature
upon himself, granting theosis to humanity. We do not glory in the sophia
of Hellenism, [but in him who declared]: 'My heavenly Father has revealed
to you this divine and ineffable rteo/ogy.' What divine and ineffable realities! He became flesh, the almighty sophia and power of God. On Mount
Tabor, taking with him those who were preeminent in arete, he underwent
transfiguration-wetaworf>/;os;s in their presence. Thus in the aeon to come
we shall be forever with the Lord, receiving ttansiigutauon-metamorphosis
from glory to glory [from] the Lord of the living and the dead, who has
been transfigured."
Ousia
\ovaia]
Paideia, Paideusis
[juu6ela, JtalSeuait;]
Education, culture. Jaeger 1939, 1:303: "The meaning of education ('paideuein') was extended beyond the training of children ('paides') to the
education of young men in particular, so as to encourage the belief that
education might extend throughout the whole of life. Suddenly the Greeks
realized that grown men too could have paideia. Originally the concept
paideia had applied only to the process of education. Now its significance
grew to include the objective side, the content of paideiajust as our
word 'culture' or the Latin 'cultura,' having once meant the process of education, came to mean the state of being educated; and then the content of
education, and finally the whole intellectual and spiritual world revealed
by education, into which any individual, according to his nationality or
social position, is born. The historical process by which the world of culture is built up culminates when the ideal of culture is consciously formulated. Accordingly it was perfectly natural for the Greeks in and after the
fourth century [B.C.], when the concept finally crystallized, to use the
word paideiain English, 'culture'to describe all the artistic forms and
the intellectual and aesthetic achievements of their race, in fact the whole
content of their tradition."
Sophia
[oocjna]
holy souls, and makes them friends of God and prophets, for nothing is acceptable to God but the person who makes his home with Sophia."
Stoicheia
[oroixela]
Elements, alphabet; thus, what is "elemental," as well as what is "elementary." Pl.Tim. 48b: "We must consider in itself the nature of fire and water,
air and earth, before the generation of the heaven, and their condition
[pathe] before the heaven was. For to this day no one has explained their
generation, but we speak as if men knew what fire and each of the others
is, positing them as archai, stoicheia (as it were, letters) of the universe,
whereas one who has ever so little intelligence should not rank them in
this analogy even so low as syllables."
Techne
[texvn]
Telos
[xeXog]
Theology
[OeoXoyia]
As distinct from economy (in addition to its more general use [indicated
here by the absence of italics] to designate any orderly reflection about divine things, whether natural or revealed). OED 11-1:275: "Greek 'theologia' meant 'an account of the gods, or of God (whether legendary or
philosophical).' In Christian Greek, the verb 'theologein' was used [as
equivalent to] 'to speak of as God, to attribute deity to,' whence theologia
had the specific sense of 'the ascription of a divine nature to Christ,' in
contrast to oikonotnia, the doctrine of his incarnation and human nature."
Theosis
[0ECO015]
Deification, divinization. Meyendorff 163-64: "Christ's humanity is penetrated with divine 'energy.' It is, therefore, a deified humanity, which, however, does not in any way lose its human characteristics. Quite to the
contrary. These characteristics become even more real and authentic by
contact with the divine model according to which they were created. In
this deified humanity of Christ's, man is called to participate, and to share
333
in its deification. This is the meaning of sacramental life and the basis of
Christian spirituality." Florovsky 3:240: "Christians, as Christians, aspire
to something greater than a 'natural' immortality. They aspire to an everlasting communion with God, or, to use the startling phrase of the early
Fathers, to a theosis."
Tyche
[TIJX1!]
Chance, luck; "fortuna" in Latin. J0.D.F.0.2..25 (PG 94:957): "Of all the
things that happen, the cause is said to be either God, or ananke, or
heimarmene, or nature [physis], or tyche, or accident [to automaton]. But
God's function has to do with ousia and providence; ananke deals with
the movement of things that ever keep to the same course; heimarmene
with the necessary accomplishment of the things it brings to pass (for
heimarmene itself implies ananke); nature with birth, growth, destruction,
plants and animals; tyche with what is rare and unexpected. For tyche is
defined as the meeting and concurrence of two causes, originating in
choice but bringing to pass something other than what is natural."
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INDEX
133
Arist.Met.I018b2.-4
55
109
Arist.Met 1064a
Arist.P^.Z4ib
66
Arist.P0Z.12.54a
Arist.P0Z.1z79
90
Arist.Cat.ib
Arist.N.io95b
Arist.EN.io98a
Arist.EN.i 104825-26
Arist.N.ii07b4-6
45
306, 307
Arist.N.no9b3i
Arist.N. 1115a-1119b
144
Arist.N.in6aio-ii
Arist.N.n28a25
Arist.N. 1129a- 1138b
Arist.EN.1133b33-11.34a6
162
119
18
306
142
141
197
141
31, 137
J
97
141, 142
180
148
Hdt.1.32
Hdt.i.57-58
3i
Horn.//. 1.3 9
HomJI.11.496
Hom.il.15.189
2.2
Horn.Od.8.492
Hom.CW.9.27
Hom.Od.20.zz940
17
Pi.O.6.1
17
13
17
33:77
17
126
Arist.EN.n39a
Arist.EN. 11
j^z^~z$
Arist.N.ii77ai5
Arist.EN. i 4 2 o b 2 0 - 2 i
307
Pl.Ap.33c
155
141
226
Arist.Mei.980a
Arist.Met 1007a
41
Pl.Cri.107cd
Pl.Grg.474b
Pl.Grg.508a
Pl.Lg.709bc
Pl.Lg.806a
120
141
45
178
178
i55> T 58
155
Pl.Me.8ib-c
134
Pl.Mrf.75b
Pl.Phd.84C-d
P\.Phd.97c-d
PLPbd.u5d-e
107
Pl.PMr.z40c
Pl.P/)(ir.246-47
Pl.Prt.32ia-c
252-53
107
316
128,134
122
Pl.Pri.322a
IO9
Pl.Prt.343b
Pl.Prt.361a
121-22
Pl.R.357-83
Pl.R. 3 6ia
Pl.R. 4 3 9d
PLR.488
Pl.R. 4 98b
Pl.R.514-17
Pl.R.52 7 b
Pl.R.533d
Pl.R.6i4b
PI.R.615C
PI.R.617C
Pl.Smp.190a
Pl.Swp.193d
Pl.Smp.2ioe-2iib
P\.Tht.i6od
Pl.Tfot.r76b
PI.TA;t.i84C
Pl.Tfot.20te
PI.Tim. 19b
Pl.TVm.z7d
Pl.T;'m.28c
Pl.TZm.29e
Pl.Tim.36e-39e
282
I42
I42
128
17
124
2Z6
178
IZ4
134
134
155
122
288
70
13 r
7i
109
353
Gn 1:6-7
Gn 1:14
188
Gn
Gn
Gn
Gn
Gn
117-18
125,131,245
1:16
1:26-27
1:27
1:31
2:7
156
Z9Z
112
Gn 2:8
Gn 2:15
97
125
Gn 5:1
Gn 9:6
Gn 14:14
Gn 15:6
Gn 27:36
283
122, 128
125
170
' '
217
2Z3
Gn 28:12
63
Ex 3:2
Ex 3:6
Ex 3:14
213
Ex
Ex
Ex
Ex
7:8-13
12:11
12:35-36
13:21
29
Ex
Ex
Ex
Ex
Ex
20:1 z
25:40
30:10
32:1-6
33:20
248
4, z n , 213-14
222-23
171, 187-88
zo6
136
226-27
229
173
49, 205,316
. Lv 16
Lv 26:13
229
20
20
Nm 4:20
229
104
122
20
20
Dt 4:24
103
114
Dt 6:4
Dt 32:39
19,94
Jgs 13:18
z i o , 213
1 Chr 24:31
1 Chr 27:22
88
88
z Chr 19:8
2 Chr z3:zo
zchr26:!2
88
2Mc4:i
2Mcio:2
95
95
4Mc7:8
95
88
88
78,313
Th.1.140
155
Gn 1:1
Gni:z
Gni:3
162,223,251,
319
80, 252 (bis)
42,218,251
Gni:4
Gn 1:5-31
Gni:5
104
116
H7,2.57
104
317
188
4Mc7:i9
4 Mc 16:25
208
88
88
Ps 1:1
125
Wis 8:7
143
Ps 2:5-9
Psz:y
Ps 8:2-3
Ps8:2
Ps 8:7-9
127
Wis 11:20
101
116
Wis
Wis
Wis
Wis
204
66
149
Ps 10:4
22
Ps i8:z
Ps 18:4
66
42
Ps 3 0 : 2 0
225
Ps 39:6
Ps 49:14
Ps 56:9
Ps75:i
Ps 76:11
Ps 78:5-6
Ps88:7
278
296
296
3i3
190, 275
86
47
'
Ps 89:9
Ps95:5
77
Ps 103:24
70, 218
Ps 109:1
206
?r
Ps 115:2
48
Ps 1 1 7 : 2 2
269
Ps 138:14
122
Ps 142:10
233
Ps 144:13
235
Ps 145:13
1 16
Ps 146:4
222
Prv 7:4
2l8
Prv 8:22
2l8-I9,
Prv 13:10
59
Eccl r:2
Ecci 5:1
178
47, 1 8 0 - 8 1
Sgi:6
13 1, 223
Sgi:8
Sg4:i6
59
Jb 1:21
35
}^9-9
Jb 26:7
222
Jb37
Jb 39:5-11
161
Wis 2:23
125
Wis 4:1
Wis 5:13
Wis 7:26
i 2
100
118
181
143
143
Z36, 3i5>3
13:1-5
13:1-9
13:5
15:13
180
7 1 . 2.13:.
95
Sir 17:3
125
Hb 3:19
62
Zee 6:12
Zee 9:17
112
Mai 3:6
189, 275
Is 7:14
Is 9:5
223-24
Is 13:10
222
139
222, 261
Is 2 2 : 1 9
265
Is 2 2 : 2 1
265
Is
Is
Is
Is
Is
122
40:13
41:4
43:10
44:6
50:4
213
213
82, 116
296
Is 52:5
309-10
Jer 23:6
2-55
Bar 3:3
206
Bar 3:38
264, 271
Sus 42
97
M t 1:20
63
M t 1:23
223-24
M t 3:10
269
Mt 3:17
Mt 5:3
Mt5:4
42
Mt5:6
Mt 5:8
164
Mt 5:9
Mt 5:10
Mt 5:23-24
Mt 5:40-44
Mt5:45
112
310
Mt 6:9
210-11
M t 6:10
322
M t 6:12
3i7, 32-3
305-6
125
129
1 6 4 - 6 5 , 204,
316
M t 7:20
112
31
312
Mt 7:24-27
Mt9:22
J*
355
3305
5
10:18
J n 10:18
130,277
298
2.98
10:30
J n 10:30
82,246
M t 11:27
54
J n 1111::11--4444
276
M t 13:39
1158
58
J n 14:2
14:2
313
Mt 14:24-30,
i1 33 22
14:6
Jn 14:6
153
Mt 16:2-3
l16611
14:30
J n 14:30
80
M t 16:26
272
2-72-
15:26
J n 15:26
88,238-40
Mt 17:1-9
16:11
J n 16:11
80
Mti7:2
2 7 8 - 79
2.78-79
278, 299
2.78,299
17:21
J n 17:21
308
Mti7:5
4242-
J n 2200::1177
268-69,276
M t 18:10
259
2-59
21:25
J n 21:25
204
M t 20:28
272
306
Acts 2:4
M t 22:3740
313
M t 22:44
206
Mt 25:32-33
3T0
Mt 25:40
309
M t 26:2627
2 9 8 - 99
Mt 28:19-20
2 1 1 - 12, 3 0 4 - 5
M t 28:19
49, 2 . 4 9 - 5 0 ,
300
Acts 2:29
Acts 2:34
206
Acts 2:36
26, 1 9 4 , 2 6 6 ,
Acts 3 : 2 1
320
274
':'< Acts 7:8
88
Acts 7:9
88
Acts 7:22
10
12
Mk 9:2-10
22 77 88-- 7 9
Acts 8:22
8:22
M k 12:36
2206
06
Acts 17:18
17:18
19,133
Acts 1 7 : 2 2 - 2 8
167
Lk 2:52
268
Lk 9 : 2 8 - 3 6
278
Lk 1 5 : 8 - 1 0
T28
Lk 1 5 : 2 2
285
Lk 16:2
265
Lki6:3
265
Lk 16:4
Lk 1 6 : 2 0
Lk 17:21
1124
24
Lk 2 0 : 3 4 - 3 6
291
291
Lk 2 0 : 4 2
206
206
Lk 22:53
8o
Jn 1:1-14
44
3,85 , 2.18, 2 5 1 ,
R o m 11:33
27J i
2-51, 2 5 1 - 5 2
55, 3 !
R o m 11:34
122
Jn 1:1
Jn 1:3
J n 1:4
1 Acts 17:23
216
54
Rom 1:20
1:20
65-66,107,110,
Rom
2:24
Rom 2:24
309-10
265
Rom
4:3
R o m 4:3
217
[48
148
R
m 5:17
5:17
R oo m
R
6:11
R oo m
m 6:11
291
80
264
267
R oo m
m 6:17
6:17
R
R oo m
m 8:9
8:9
R
Room
m 8:29
8:29
R
125
Rom 8 : 3 8 - 3 9
51
Rom
313
11:16
217,2.37
240
R o m 11:36
258
R o m 12:1
278
*,i78
x,
4
9
,
186, 2 0 4 ,
X
'.49'l86'.2..4'
224-25, 23233,260, 316
x, 7 6 , 2 9 6 ,
297 (bis), 306
Rom
2:5
m I 12:5
308
R o m 12:6
58
112-1:3
112- -13
R
13:14
R oo m
m 13:14
124
J 4 = 34
32-5
32.5
11 CCoorr 1:17
19
Jn8:54
34
1 C o r 1:20
1:20
179
Jn 1 0 : 1 7
269
2.69
1C
Coorr 1:24
1:24
93,218-19,269
J"I:I4
J"
I : l 8
Jn4:I6-26
n
269
I105,
O
33
i Cor i : z 8
i C o r 1:30
1 C o r 2:7
1 C o r 2:9
i8,43
E p h 1:10
265
2-55
228
E p h 1:23
308
E p h 2:2122
204
Eph 3 : 2
Eph 3:9
265
265
Eph 3 : 1 0 - 1 2
308
1 C o r 2:18
3*4
66
1 C o r 3:19
13
2
Eph 3 : 1 4 - 1 5
88
2-3
Eph 3:18
258
48
Eph 4:12
308
76-77
265
Eph 4 : 1 5 - 1 6
263
Eph 5:32
47
1 C o r 4:1
1 C o r 5:8
1 C o r 8:2
1 Cor 8:5-6
;,
1 Cor 9:17
1 C o r 11:1
1 C o r 11:7
3r7
125
1 C o r 12:6
262
1 Cor. 1 2 : 2 7
308
i C o r 13:9
1 C o r 13:12
1 C o r 13:13
48
Eph 6:2
136
Eph 6:4
Phil 1:19
240
Phil 2 : 6 - 1 1
211
Phil 2:6
243
Phil 2:7
266
x, 4 8 , 9 8 , 2 2 5 ,
271-72.,
315 (bis)
Phil 2 : 9 - 1 1
212-13
57,141,302
Phil 2 : 1 0 - 1 1
324
1 C o r 15:13
287
Phil 2:10
i n , 260
1 C o r 15:20
287-88
Phil 3:1314
163
1 Cor 15:22
267
Phil 3:13
48, 139
1 Cor 15:28
324, 3 2 5 - 2 6
Phil 3:20
312
Phil 4:7
Phil 4:8
1 C o r 15:42
132
1 C o r 15:49
125
1 C o r 15:5253
225
2 C o r 3:15
277
Col 1:15
2 C o r 3:17
240
Col 1:16
83-84, 108,
258,308
52
, 129, 137,
141,143
2 C o r 3:18
125
2 C o r 4:4
Col 1:17
2 Cor 4:16
284
Col 1:19
112-13
2 C o r 4:18
107
C o l 1:24
308
2 C o r 5:10
324
C o l 1:25
265
2 C o r 5:19
2012
C o l 2:8
104, 178
2 Cor 12:1-10
275
Col 2:9
264
2 C o r 12:15
315
Col 2 : 1 6 - 1 7
226
2 Cor 1 2 : 2 - 4
48
Col 2:19
308
2 C o r 12:34
234
301
Col 2:20
104
2 C o r 12:4
C o l 3:14
321
2 C o r 13:14
211, 249-50
Col 3:1
129
Col 3:10
125
260
Gal 2:20
291
Gal 3:28
291
1 Thes 4:13
33, 132
Gal 4:3
Gal 4:6
104
1 Thes 4:14
287
240
1 Thes 4:17
321
Gal 4 : 2 6
312
G a l 5:13
124
1 T m 1:4
265
i Tm z:4
I Tm
i Tm
1 Tm
1 Tm
2:5
3:7
3:15
3:16
H e b 11:1
216, 217
H e b 11:3
257-58
H e b 11:10
95
H e b 12:29
103
Jas 2:19
302
Jas 3:9
125
283
1 Pt Z : I I
240
4 9 , Z04, 2 7 1 , 2 8 7 ,
316
1 Pt 4:13
2-3
55> 1 3 0 ^ 7 8 ,
32-5
178, z 7 8
.,''
276
306
x, ZZ5, Z34, 2 7 1 ,
302
1 Tm 4:4
1 Tm 6:16
z T m 1:10
357
287
2 Pt 1:3
M3
2 Pt 1:4
2 Pt 1 : 1 6 - 1
9, 135
143
278-79
z Tm z:i3
z Tm 3:16
Z1516
Heb 1.1
Heb 1:3
62
2 Pt 3:10
104
3, 116, 2 3 6 , 2 4 2 -
2 Pt 3 : i z
104
i)ni:$
103
Jude 3
229
Rv 1:4
Rv 3:1 z
22
220
4 3 , 3^1
Heb
Heb
Heb
Heb
Heb
z:59
3:19
4:15
7:4
7:25
H e b 10:1
12.7
62
2 Pt 1:5
191
8 8 , 278
226-27
273
General
The names of Basil of Caesarea, Gregory of Nazianzus, Gregory of Nyssa, and Macrina appear on almost every page of the book, as do such concepts as philosophy and transcendence, and therefore
they are not listed separately in the Index. Similarly, because the names of Classical and biblical authors appear also in the Classical and Biblical Index, under the specific passages from their writings
that are cited in the book, references to them in this index focus primarily on their life and thought
rather than on their works as such.
Abortion, 147
Abraham, 48, 170
Absolute and relational terms, 42, 49, 213,
*53-54
Actions [energeiai], as guide to divine nature,
2078, 236; as source for divine names, 210
Adam and Eve, 130, 150-51, 242, 244, 258;
Christ as second Adam, 189, 267, 28485,
286
Adrianople, Battle of {378), 307-8
Aeon (see also Glossary): in Gregory of Nyssa,
111; as witness to God, 94
Aetius, Arian theologian (d. ca. 370), 19, 231
Affirmation. See Cataphasis
Alexander, Samuel, n o
Allegory, attacked by Basil, 30, 226; employed
-JJV
TJeneral Index
General Index
359
Evil: not result of ananke, 159; eventual annihilation of, 81, 323-26; arete as separation
from, 112; as argument for existence of God,
8 0 - 8 1 , 14041; discernment of, by God,
6263; economy concealed in, 265; good as
"absence of evil," 4 1 ; not source of human
nature, 6364; and image of God, 139-40;
as mutable, 197-98; natural horror of, 1 3 9 40; as nonbeing, 140; power of, and dualism, 7980; and providence, 159
Experience: religious, as mystical ecstasy, 4 7 48, 2012, 301, 315; of saints, 204-5. See
also Holy Spirit; Sense experience [aisthesis];
Subjectivity
faith: and apophasis, 57; defined in New Testament, 216, 217, 264; of demons, 302; relation to knowledge and thought, 196, 216;
and miracle, 257; fulfilled by reason, 2728,
195-96, 215-30; as "theological virtue,"
141,302
Father: as causality, 67; gender of the noun,
8788; "in heaven," 112; as metaphor,
206-7; as "relational noun" for God, 4 8 -
General Index
49, zn12, also eternally, 274; transcendent Fatherhood of God, 87-89, 237-38; in
Trinity, 44-45,'54. See also Analogy and
metaphor; Son of God; Trinity
Filioque, Western addition to the NicenoConstantinopolitan Creed, 2 3 9 - 4 1 . See also
Eastern and Western churches; Holy Spirit;
Trinity
Florence, Council of (1439), 24041
Florovsky, Georges, quoted: on Cappadocians,
8: Basil, 306; Gregory of Nazianzus, 270;
Gregory of Nyssa, 137, 272-73; on Patristic
theology, 58; on "the predicament of the
Christian historian," 185; on PseudoDionysius, 209; on theosis, 28182; on triumph of Christianity, 170
Fortitude or courage [andreia], 129, 141, 142
Free will, 12931, 139; opposed to ananke,
159-60; and hell, 32324; and morality,
144, 15556; preeminent among human
qualities, 160; needed for responsibility, 283.
See also Image of God; Sin
Gaudel, Auguste-Joseph, quoted, 6970
Gender. See Sexuality
Genesis, Book of: relation to Plato's Timaeus,
20, <)6. See also Hexaemeron; Moses; Classical and Biblical Index
Gibbon, Edward, quoted, 170, 172, 174
Gifford, Lord Adam, 4; Gifford Lectures, 4-5
Gilson, Etienne, Gifford Lectures of, 4 - 5 , 95;
on "Christian Socratism," 58; on Thomism,
68
God: etymology of "theos," 4849, 137, and
of "God," 137; as "fifth element" in Aristotle, 66; gender of nouns for, 8 7 - 8 8 ;
knowledge of {see Knowledge); nature of, 28;
as one (see Monotheism; One); philosophers
on, 32; self-identity of, 209; simple, not
composite, 55, 62, 74, 86, 127, 198, 208,
24 T; undefinability of, 20; universal will for
salvation, 55-56, 313, 324-26. See also
Apatheia
Good: as absence of evil, 4 1 ; God as perfect
good, 7 0 - 7 1 , 137-38; "participation
[metousia] in," as image of God, 127, 138
39, 157
Gorgonia, sister of Gregory of Nazianzus, 298,
299
Grace: and faith, 219-20; and free will, 130,
159-60; and nature, 27
Greek language: Cappadocians' use and approval of, 10, 13-15, 30, 176; etymology of
"theos," 4 8 - 4 9 ; gender of nouns for God,
361
History (continued)
chatological interpretation of, 321; evil in,
140; according to doctrines of tyche, 152
53. See also Economy; Time
Holy Spirit: and angels, 259; apophasis and
cataphasis in language for, 45, 215-16; authorities for doctrine of, 24-25, 19596;
Cappadocian role in history of doctrine of,
233, 241, 252, 304-5; and religious experience, 4748, 6465, 304; as "God," not a
creature, 197, 202, 233; name of, 45; gender
of "pneuma" in Greek as neuter, 87-88;
Greek anticipations of, 3 3, 187, 25 2 5 3;
and perfection, 139; "pneuma theou" as always referring to, 252; procession of, 239 ,
41; and theosis, 134-35; a r | d unity of humanity, 312-13. See also Trinity
Homer, 17, 33, 141, 221. See also Classical
and Biblical Index
Homoousios, one in being (see also Glossary):
Arians on, 193; case for, 242-43; innovation
at Nicaea, 43; natural analogies for, 33, 242.
See also Logos; Nicaea; Nicene (NicenoConstantinopolitan) Creed; Trinity
Hope: absence of, 132; for apocatastasis, 161,
323-24; for kingdom of God, 162-63; f r
resurrection, 289; for salvation, 144; as
theological virtue, 141, 302
Hypostasis (see also Glossary): as feminine
noun, 8 7 - 8 8 ; and Latin, 24344; in New
Testament, 3; relation to ousia at Nicaea and
in subsequent usage, 243-44
Idolatry. .S'ee Polytheism
Ignorance [agnoia], 203, 234, 282
Image of God, 120-35, 280-95: opposed to
ananke, 1 56; apatheia in creation and restoration of, 126, 292; consisting of reason, free
will, and immortality, 127; content of, 164;
death not part of, 292; the devil and "disfigurement" of image of God through sin, 2 8 1 82; dominion over creatures, as part of, 125;
evil and, 139-40; and incarnation, 192,
286-87; moral implications of, 123-24,
125; "participation [metousia] in the good,"
as, 127, 138-39, 157; reason as, 12729;
"restoration" and transformation of, 2 8 5 86, 287, 314, 316, 321-22; and sense experience [aisthesis], 126; sexuality and, 2 9 2 93; and sin, 280-81, 285. See also Free will;
Immortality; Reason; Theosis
Immortality: and arete, 132, 144-45; a n d
baptism, 305; denied by Epicureanism, 19,
145; as belonging to God alone, 287; Greek
teaching of, commended, 32, 194; as image
General Index
363
25253, 291; and translation "virgin [parthenos]," 223-24; worship by, 220, 296,
303. See also under Language and languages,
"Hebrew"; Septuagint
14647, 195, as presupposition, 196-97; revealed, 27, 196-97, 269; Roman, 174-75.
See also Moses; Politics; Revelation; Society
Leo I, Pope (d. 461), 276
364
General Index
General Index
of creatures, not only sin, as ground for apophasis, 5152, 28283; God and Christ as
"ho on" and the only being, 34, 108, 213
14, 265, 266; great chain of being, 26162;
ousia as being or essence, 242, in relation to
hypostasis, 24344 (see also Glossary); as
presupposition, 198, 274-75; things, as created in their being, 97; and Trinity, 238-39;
visible and invisible, as ontological distinction, 1078, n o , 259, 260-62; and vision
of God, 165. See also Homoousios
Order: as Classical and Christian arete, 31,
13637, 150, 307-8; cosmic order and
God, 68-69, 158, 163; preferable to disorder, 9 1 ; natural, in ways of knowing, 58,
174, 19495; m revelation, 26869; ' n sa l~
vation, 285-86, 311-12, 319
Orientation, prayer facing the East, 112, 229
Origen of Alexandria, early Christian scholar
(d. ca. 254), 6; doctrine of apocatastasis,
324-25; relation to Cappadocians, 7; Contra Celsum, 37-38; special relation to Gregory of Nyssa, 29-30; Hexapla, 224-25; On
First Principles [Peri Archonj, 37-38, 85; as
scholar, 2930; on Song of Songs, 30, 47;
on the soul, 124
Otis, Brooks, quoted, 6, 114, 325
Ousia. See Ontology
Paideia, education (see also Glossary): as "first
of our advantages" and as "riches," 175-76,
188; economy as, 272, 32021; Moses as
supreme example of, 10, 13, 31-32; and nature, 31, 14142; need for, 174-75; philosophy of, 175-76. See also Scholarship and
study
Pantheism, critique of, 81, 9 2 - 9 3 , 257-58
"Pantokrator," as title for God, 25354
Paradox, 158-59, 197, 208, 26465
Passion: of Christ on the cross, 273, 275-76,
291, 295; divine nature free of, 86, 126,
193; and gods of polytheism, 78; human, 47,
145, 29091, to be defeated by reason, 293.
See also Apatheia; Begetting; Sexuality
Paul, apostle: on arete, 141; at Athens, 19, 28,
54, 133, 167, 216; on creation, 52, 83, 107;
ecstatic experience of, 48, 2012, 301, 315
16; imitator of Christ, 272, 317. See also
Classical and Biblical Index
Peace, 52, 150
Perfection [teleiosis, teleiotes], 69-70: arete as
path to, 145, 153, 323; as eschatological,
150-51, 312, 318, 323; God as, 86, 150,
318. See also Change; Telos
365
366
General Index
General Index
Sexuality: abortion, 147-48; as analogy, 4 6 47; in creation, 88, 148, 197, 292-93; as
"departure from the prototype," 293; Greek
and Christian attitudes to, 31, 147; in eschatology, 88, 291; ascription of gender to
deity, 8 6 - 8 7 ; male and female in society, 31,
147, 308; passion and, 291; satiety with,
164. See also Asceticism; Marriage; Morality; Passions
Sin: and apophatic language, 51-52, 2023;
as bondage, 276, 282, 283; as fault of free
will, 283; and finiteness, as ground for limitation of knowledge (See under Creation); as
"defacing" of image of God, 28081, or loss
of it, 285. See also Evil; Image of God; Salvation
Slavery. See under Politics; Society
Society: cities, 146, 17173; class, 6, 9, 13,
172, 182, 302; diversity between ethical systems, 143; equality and hierarchies within
society, 47, 148-49, 172; labor, 149; male
and female, 31, 147, 308; pagans sometimes
superior to Christians in social consciousness, 146, 307, 309; poverty, 123-24, 14849> l59> 39; property and wealth, 149,
159; slavery, 46, 148. See also Asceticism;
Church; Law; Marriage; Morality; Politics;
Sexuality
Socrates, 9; Cappadocians' attitude to, 19-20;
on likeness to God, 71; on the senses, 109;
"Christian Socratism," 19-20, 58
Socrates Scholasticus, Byzantine historian (d.
45), 49, 2-97
Solomon, king of Israel: as author of Proverbs,
Ecclesiastes, Song of Songs, and Wisdom, 47,
59, 178, 224, 311; on limits of knowledge,
47, 1 8 0 - 8 1 ; as possessing sophia, 218. See
also Classical and Biblical Index
Son of God, Jesus Christ as, 44, 54; Eunomius
on, 232; as metaphor, 206-7; n o t i n time,
117, 194, 274; transcendent Fatherhood,
8789, 23738. See also Father; Jesus
Christ; Logos; Trinity
Song of Songs, commentaries on by Origen
and Gregory of Nyssa, 30, 47, 180, 182,
308, 312. See also Classical and Biblical Index; Solomon
Sophia, wisdom (see also Glossary): as human
367
JZ5
Genera! Index